A New Set of Rules
by Korzark
Summary: [[[CANCELLED]]] Edward learns that the "Truth" of his world is not enough to bring his little brother back, but if his world's Truth is not enough, he is determined to travel to another world, find their Truth, and finally take what he had been chasing for his whole life. [Alternate ending to FMABrotherhood/manga. Spoilers ahead]
1. Chapter 1

**Hey guys, new story. Yay.  
**

 **I mention this in the summary, but this takes place pretty much at the end of FMA:Brotherhood/the FMA manga as an alternate ending to what actually happens. If you haven't watched/read it already, obvious spoilers ahead.**

* * *

The air was charged with a strange energy. Many events had led to this climax but even after the final blow was dealt, felling the creature who claimed to have harnessed god's powers for itself, conflicting emotions ran rampant. Nobody knew whether to cheer or cry. The young man who stood in the center of the clearing could barely register what had just happened.

On one hand, the threat was gone and humanity was saved but many lives were taken as the cost for victory. The young man morbidly noted that this small war seemed to follow the laws of equivalent exchange, just like the alchemy that had been used to end it.

He looked down at his feet to see a broken suit of armour that once housed the soul of his little brother. Alphonse had exchanged his soul so Edward could get his arm back once again. Edward was now in a frantic state of mind, thinking of all the possible ways to try and bring his brother back.

He promised Alphonse that he would never use a human soul to restore either of their bodies so the only option was to use something else. But there was nothing in the world that could be equivalent to a human life. Edward racked his brains to try and think of something that he could use.

With a spark of inspiration, he realized something that the world might consider to be even greater than a single human soul.

"May, back up," he said to the tear-stained girl who lay hunched over his brother's old body. Picking up a stick off the ground, he started to carefully draw a pattern in the dirt. He cringed a bit at the pattern on the ground, but continued with determination. Hopefully this would be the last human transmutation circle he would ever see.

Despite the shock on his friends' faces, he stood in the center of the circle and clapped his hands together. "I'll be right back," he said. He hoped that his expression was much more confident than he felt. "Here comes the Fullmetal Alchemist's final transmutation." He slammed his hands against the ground and felt the disturbingly familiar feeling of being deconstructed. He felt his body disappearing from the world and his consciousness slipping away with it.

When he opened his eyes, he saw nothing but a white silhouette of himself, sitting casually in front of a large door. "Come for your brother, eh?" The thing, "Truth" as it called itself, never seemed to talk. Edward only felt its words resonate inside him. "How do you plan to extract a human being? How will you pay? Will you offer me your entire being?"

Edward ignored its suggestion and walked past it as casually as he could. As he walked up to the door that seemed to hold all the secrets of the world, he felt his confidence gradually increase. The only thing that would be equal to a soul would be the laws of the entire world itself.

"All is one, one is all," he thought to himself.

"I've got your payment right here," Edward said, not even bothering to confirm his suspicions. "It's really big, though."

A moment of silence passed before anything happened. "The gate of truth lies within every human being. Thus, it is also the potential of those human beings to use alchemy." Edward heard the words echo through his mind. The words were mostly emotionless, but he thought he could sense a bit of surprise in them. "Will you sacrifice the power to use alchemy and simply become an ordinary human being?"

"I've always been an ordinary human. Just a little man who couldn't even save one poor girl they turned into a chimera. Someone who caught a glimpse of the 'Truth' and started over-relying on its gift only to fail again and again… It's all been one long dance."

"Are you sure you're alright with losing this?"

Edward turned around to catch a glimpse of Truth's featureless face. "I don't need alchemy as long as I've got my friends."

As Truth gave him a wide grin, Edward turned back around to face the Gate and mentally prepared himself to pay the largest toll that alchemy had to offer but Truth's next words shocked him.

"I sincerely hope that's the right answer, alchemist," he heard. It took him a second to register what it had just said. He turned around to see Truth giving him a wide grin and an uncharacteristic shrug.

"What- what do you mean by that?" Edward asked uncertainly. He never imagined that the being known as Truth wouldn't know the truth to something, but here it was. Truth only shook it's head.

"You of all people should know that there isn't only one Truth," it told him, pointing up towards the sky. Edward followed the direction it was pointing and his eyes widened in shock. It was another gate. "I am just one of many. You just live in a world that follows my word."

A few seconds passed before Edward regained his senses. Shaking his head, he steeled his mind and turned to face Truth. "What does that mean for me?"

"It means that I don't know how to transmute myself. You were the only human to ever try."

"So is that it? Is this the end?" Edward asked, clenching his fists together until his knuckles turned white.

"No," it replied, giving Edward a spark of hope. "Probably," it continued, giving a small chuckle.

"I don't know how to transmute myself, but that doesn't mean that nobody knows how," it said as it pointed to the sky once again. "Go to another world and learn how their truth works. Maybe they'll have an idea on how to trade me off for your little brother. Simple right?" Looking between Truth and the gate it was pointing to, Edward grimaced but nodded his head.

"Of course," he said grimly. "I'll be back before you know it."

The door above him opened up and Edward saw darkness within, but it was unfamiliar to him. Somehow it seemed to be different from the door of Truth that he was so used to, but that wasn't going to stop him.

As a group of shadowy tendrils extended down to claim him, he turned to his world's Truth. "Got any tips for me?" he asked.

Truth never dropped its smile. "The other world follows an entirely set of rules. You'll be a foreign object, so be careful about what might happen over there. Will you be eliminated by the world itself? Will you still subscribe to your world's Truth? Will your body assimilate to the laws of the new world? Who knows? It's been a while since I've been so clueless." It shook its head though it was still grinning. "Whatever the case, have fun. Hopefully you'll see me again soon."

Edward nodded as he felt the new Gate of Truth pull him towards itself.

"Also, don't worry about time," Truth said with a final set of parting words. "These are two completely different worlds. Just focus on learning all that you can. After all, I'm pretty curious about how this new world works too."

Then everything seemed to explode.

Whenever he entered the Gate, which was much more often than he had liked, he felt as if the entirety of his body was systematically being deconstructed. It was a painful and unnerving process whenever he felt his body simply leaving him. This Gate was different in that he wasn't being deconstructed but instead, he felt his body being overloaded with a large amount of energy. At least with his Gate, you couldn't feel the pain in an arm you didn't have. With this Gate, he had no such solace.

But it was over in an instant.

He opened his eyes to find he was lying down on his back. The ground was surprisingly soft and he could feel a light breeze tickling his face. His vision was blurry, but he could see a lot of red around him, illuminated by a soft light above.

After moving around a bit, he confirmed that he was still completely there, though he still wasn't all too used to having both of him arms being made of flesh. Moving around, he heard a soft crunching sound and after picking a small object off the ground and holding it close to his face, he confirmed that it was a bright red leaf.

"Nothing too strange yet," he commented to no one in particular as he got up slowly. He leaned on a tree before rubbing his eyes. His vision was still slightly blurry, but it was getting better now. Edward was pleased to learn that it was only temporary.

A moment passed before Edward could finally gather his bearings, and he straightened himself up. "Well, I guess there's no time like the present," he said as he patted down his clothes, or at least what was left of them after the intense battle with the Homunculus. "I hope this world has people in it other than me," he mumbled to himself.

Though he gave out a big sigh, he decided to be grateful that he was alive in the first place, and that he had the opportunity to finally revive his little brother's body, even though it involved travelling so far into the unknown. He was grateful that the Gate hadn't decided to kill him, and he was grateful that he wasn't killed as soon as he fell into this new world. As peaceful and empty the forest seemed, he had no way of knowing exactly how much danger it held. Fortunately him being alive meant that he probably wasn't in any immediate danger.

It was also nice how he could actually see, despite it being night time. He had the bright moon to thank for that.

Despite the fact that he had literally punched a god to death mere minutes before, he was surprised to find his eyes widening after looking up to acknowledge the current source of his light.

"I guess that settles it. I'm not in Amestris anymore."

The broken moon continued to shine its light down.

* * *

 **So this chapter was pretty short, but that's pretty much because I wanted to provide a short explanation and reason as to why Edward is in the RWBY universe in the first place. I could've made the chapter a bit longer I guess, but what's done is done.**

 **If you enjoy this, thanks for enjoying.**


	2. Chapter 2

Ozpin was facing a dilemma.

Just a few minutes before, Ozpin gave a small sigh of delight as he sipped the last bit of coffee from his mug. He relished the few precious moments when he could finish a good cup of coffee and experience the effects of the tranquil energy in the privacy of his own office. It had taken him a small moment before he returned to full consciousness as he stretched his limbs to bask in the post-coffee glow and to congratulate himself for finishing half of his piled up paperwork before nightfall.

He had looked out towards the setting sun, and immediately regretted the decision. The broken moon gave him a painful warning that the day had ended long ago and that Ozpin just drank the equivalent of five cups of strong coffee.

Now Ozpin was seriously considering the benefits of knocking himself out so he could get trade a few hours of sleep for a bruise. He weighed the pros and cons, but there was also the problem of lacking a clean method to knock himself out. He knew it wouldn't hurt too badly because of his aura, but it would also be very difficult to do because of his aura.

He sighed, knowing that he had to sleep to be functional the next day. Coffee could only keep him going for so long. He learned that the hard way in his first year of teaching.

He sat back in his desk and connected to the CCT, quickly searching up methods to make a contraption that could knock him out. He consulted the instructions of a demolitions company called ACME, but due to the need for anvils that he didn't have at hand, he sighed and disconnected.

Distracted form his original purpose, he switched to the surveillance camera feeds of the Grimm infested areas in Beacon's jurisdiction. Despite the dangers, no one could deny that they were beautiful. Ozpin agreed completely and would often find himself lost in the sights.

Forever Fall was a nice change of pace. After overanalysing the place for any unpredictable elements to ensure the upmost safety for the first years' initiation test, Emerald Forest had temporarily lost its flare.

In contrast to the lush green landscape, Forever Fall had a warmer feeling to it. The moon broken moon provided more than enough light for Ozpin to admire the bright red and golden colours that flashed throughout the night. Ozpin frowned, catching his last thought. Gold?

He started switching through the cameras, trying to find the object that didn't belong. Gold was not a colour that belonged in Forever Fall. It was possible that he saw the white of a Grimm mask, but he was almost certain that that wasn't the case.

His face paled when he saw the anomaly. Blonde hair. A young boy that he didn't recognize was wandering through the forest, covered in wounds blood.

"Oobleck!" He wasted no time in slamming the button that activated the intercom to the green-haired professor's room. "Get to Forever Fall now. I don't care how you do it, a young civilian is alone and injured," he said, hoping that Oobleck was still awake from the copious amounts of coffee that he constantly drank.

"I'll be right on it," he heard. Ozpin opened his scroll and sent Oobleck the coordinates of the boy's location.

Ozpin wanted to pace around the office, but the surveillance feed kept him too occupied. Switching from camera to camera, he made a quick note of the boy's immediate surroundings. When he saw the white, red, and black of a nearby Grimm his heart sank.

It was a small Ursa, a creature that most of his students could kill without breaking a sweat, but to a regular civilian, the meeting with one of these creatures would only be followed up with certain death. Thankfully, the Ursa hadn't noticed the boy yet, but Ozpin knew that was sure to change. He had no doubt that the boy's negative emotions were essentially acting as a lighthouse for the Grimm after being injured and lost.

He gripped his cane and berated himself for allowing the security around the borders of Forever Fall to be so lax that a civilian could wander in. He scolded himself for being so cocky about the fact that nothing like this had ever happened under his watch before.

Shaking his head, he stopped thinking about his failures and started to focus on what he could do now. Oobleck was fulfilling his own job as the emergency response professor, but it was possible that he wouldn't get there in time before the Ursa inevitably noticed the boy and tore him to pieces.

He had a few cameras around the forest that were capable of turning into remotely controlled drones. Could he activate a few of them and lead the Ursa away? He shook his head, rejecting the idea. The drones were not made for combat and the Ursa could easily catch up to them and destroy them. The crunching of the machines would be loud and perhaps draw more Grimm to the area. He considered using the drones to lead the boy away from the Grimm instead, but he hesitated. If the boy was easily scared, he might yell out after seeing the drone and bring the Grimm directly towards him. Ozpin wasn't ready to take such a gamble that might shorten his life.

Ozpin's thoughts were interrupted as he noticed movement. The Ursa's nose was up in the air, sniffing for the strange scent that it had just picked up. Ozpin paled, realizing that the Ursa was only moments away from finding the boy and attacking.

He had no more time to think. With the press of a few buttons, he activated all the drones in the surrounding area. He led them a few of them to intercept the Ursa's path to the boy, but it mostly ignored them and barreled through without a care. Sending the rest to go to the boy's location, he watched nervously as the Ursa drew closer.

When the Ursa burst through the trees and into the small clearing where the boy was, it took a moment to roar at the boy first. Ozpin, thankful of the intimidation tactic that many of the Grimm seemed to enjoy, urged his drones closer. When the Ursa finally started to lumber forward, Ozpin activated his semblance.

He started to feel the uncomfortable, but familiar feeling of time slowing down around him. He wasted none of this extra time as he analyzed the situation more closely. Commanding one drone on a collision course towards the Ursa's eye, he watched as the boy reacted with a look of surprise. The Ursa didn't seem to notice the drone until it crashed into it. Taking a swipe at it, Ozpin noted the slow trajectory and tried to calculate a path for the drone so it could crash into it's side. Determining that the drone wouldn't be fast enough to avoid the wide claws, he sent it as far back as possible and sent two other drones to crash into the Ursa's back. He watched as the Ursa slowly reached for the retreating drone, catching it and easily destroying it, but receiving an annoying sting in the back as a response.

Ozpin watched the Ursa's movement, and noted in horror that the Ursa was not moving to swat the two new drones behind him, but had decided to ignore them and slowly run at the boy in a mad dash instead. Ozpin instantly sent the rest of his observational drones, towards the path of the beast but he knew they would never cause any damage. The Ursa could easily ignore them and claim its prize.

Ozpin slumped in his chair, distraught at his own inability to do anything to help. He watched as the Ursa leaped at the boy and fell at a slow descent. Ozpin didn't bother to turn off his semblance. He could feel his aura being drained and his body burning, but he decided that he needed to burn this memory into his mind.

He had seen many deaths, many of which were caused by his own confidence. Though this was just one of the many, it had been a few years since he had seen the death of such a young civilian. He was determined to give the boy the respect he deserved by watching his death until the end. He clapped his hands together, closed his eyes, and prayed. He didn't believe in any sort of god, but he did it anyways. He prayed that whatever god the boy was praying to, was watching over him.

Opening his eyes after his brief moment of agnosticism, he looked up to notice that the boy was no longer praying. Perhaps he lost his faith after facing the harsh reality of death. He watched solemnly as the boy tried to duck his head down and dodge the claw headed towards him. Ozpin noted sadly that, by the trajectory of the two objects, the boy would still be hit.

And then the boy's hands hit the ground and everything changed.

Ozpin's eyes widened as flashes of electricity seemed to emanate from the boy's hands and into the ground. Deactivating his semblance, Ozpin watched as two giant slabs of stone seemed to fold upwards and slam into the Ursa, trapping and incapacitating the Ursa.

"What was that?" he asked himself, no longer worried about the boy's safety. "Was that… magic?" The manipulation of the elements was not a strange concept to most people, but that was only when dust was involved. Without it, such a task was impossible unless of course, you had magic on your side.

Without thinking, he sent one of observational drones closer. At this distance, he could see that the boy wasn't visibly carrying any dust on his person. Though he wanted to inspect the boy more, there was a sudden jolt in the video feed. After apparently grabbing the strange object, the boy brought it curiously closer so he could inspect it, giving Ozpin a clear look at his face. He noted that unlike his initial diagnosis of the boy being weak and scared, the boy's determined and confident expression surprised him.

He let out his breath for what felt like the first time that night.

Grabbing his scroll, he pulled up Oobleck's contact information. "Oobleck, is that you?" he asked once he heard the ringing on the other end of the phone stop.

"Yes yes, it's me and I'm on my way. I'm currently only a few hundred meters away from the coordinates you gave me."

"Fall back Oobleck, you can go back to sleep," Ozpin said, as he reached over for the coffee machine.

A moment of unusual silence came from the hyperactive professor.

"Is something wrong Oobleck?" Ozpin asked, almost certain that the only times he had Oobleck so silent were when he was asleep.

"No it's nothing sir," he heard. "Are you sure you don't want me to go down there? There might not be much of the body left, but I'm sure the civilian's family would appreciate having a proper funeral."

Ozpin fumbled with his mug as he realized what his words must have sounded like. "Nonono, I didn't mean that the boy died out there," Ozpin corrected. "It's actually one of our transfer students who didn't make it to the initiation. He's somewhat of a special student, so I gave him an exemption for being late, but I still felt the need to give him some sort of test. It seems I had just forgotten about this and called you in a panic."

Ozpin heard a sigh of relief coming from the other end of the scroll. "Okay then sir, thank you for letting me know. It would have obviously been much better if you hadn't forgotten about that small detail before you called for me, but I realize the first few days of the year are always the most-stressful-for-you-and-that-this-student-seems-to-be-an-unusual-andspecialcaseforhimtobeinitiatedthiswaybutIstillhavefaithinyourdecisionsand-"

"That's enough Oobleck," Ozpin interrupted before the man decided to tell an impromptu history lesson. "You may return to your quarters. I'll have Glynda retrieve the student once he finishes with his trials."

"Yes yes, of course." Ozpin immediately closed the call and searched up Glynda's contact information.

"Glynda, I need you to get to Forever Fall immediately," he said. "There's a young boy out there on his own."

"Shouldn't you be calling Oobleck for this?" Glynda's reply had a tight sense of professionalism and concern, though it could not fully mask her sleepiness. "I don't think I could reach Forever Fall as fast as he could."

"It's not the boy that's the problem Glynda," he said. "It's what he can do. I think he was using magic."

A moment of silence passed before he heard a response. "Are you sure? If it's a young boy, he shouldn't be able to possess the power of a maiden."

"I don't think this is related to the maidens at all. It's magic, but it's something new."

"I will be there as soon as possible." The connection cut out and Ozpin quickly sent the coordinates to Glynda's scroll.

* * *

Edward looked down at the little metal contraption in his hand. It was a strange object, one he had obviously never seen before, but he figured that he should have expected that after entering what was literally, a new world. If metal bird were something that existed in this world, then he would eventually have to accept it. He let the bird go and watched as it revolved around him.

Ignoring the bird, he instead turned his attention to the thing he had just trapped. He couldn't get a good look at it while he was being attacked, but he figured that would be easy to do once it was captured. Peering through the cracks of the makeshift walls he had created, he was surprised to see what was essentially a grotesque bear.

"So it looks like there are bears here too," he commented. Despite the strange tattoo-like markings and the white bony face masks, it was still bear-like in its form. "At least you're not made out of metal too."

The bear only growled in response.

"Well, Mr. Bear, it looks like you're an unlucky guy. Someone sent me here to figure out how this place works and I just didn't know where to start," he said as he casually transmuted a spear out of a nearby rock. "Looks like you're my first volunteer test subject." Not waiting for a reply, he walked up to the bear with an evil grin. Watching its frantic movements, he kind of felt sorry for it but reminded himself that he was sent to this world to complete a task. Also this thing attacked him first.

With his spear, Edward stabbed at the bear's neck in hopes of killing it in the most humane way possible. Surprisingly enough, the spear pierced through the bear's neck quite easily, dropping its head directly at Edward's feet. With a yelp, he jumped back expecting to be hit with a spray of warm blood, but none was spilt. Curious, Edward walked up to pick up the head, but as he moved back forward, he let out another yelp as the head started to dissolve away in his hands along with the trapped body.

"Huh, I wonder if that's normal around here. If only there were something else to test that on."

For a second he looked at the metal bird that continued to hover around him, but quickly shook the suggestion out of his mind. The birds were obviously friendly considering they tried to help him defeat the bear, and now that he thought about it, some of them were already destroyed when they tried to defend him.

Looking around the area where the bear came from, he saw the remains of some of the birds lying around the ground. After bowing his head in respect, he knelt down to analyse the remains. He sighed after discovering what he found. He didn't dabble with machinery too often, but after being friends with Winry his whole life, he at least knew what it looked like. The wires and plating told him that this was man made.

At this point, all these unexpected findings were going to give him a headache. It was an entirely different world sure, but was it really necessary to be that different?

He reached out and grabbed at the strange contraption. Bringing it closer for inspection, he saw a lens that he hadn't noticed before.

"Hey is anyone watching?" he asked, uncertain about whether remotely controlled contraptions were more likely than the existence of tiny pilots. He hoped that it wasn't the latter or else he had just witnessed a few deaths. "You want to let me know how to get to a safer place?"

The contraption didn't say anything in response, but instead glowed with a soft red light. Looking up, Edward noticed that a few more lights had appeared in the forest, seemingly leading him down a set path.

"Hopefully, these guys are nice," he said as he let go of the metal contraption, and followed the lights.

He walked along at a medium pace, not questioning of the strange directions that the lights often seemed to lead him towards. Whenever there was a strange turn or an inconvenient path, he would assume that whoever was controlling these lights was simply trying to lead him away from the attention of those creatures that he had defeated.

Eventually he came to the center of a wide clearing. After he caught up to the last glowing light to see that no other lights had appeared, he sat down and groaned. After going on that trek, the relative calm started to quiet the adrenaline that had accumulated in his body after the hours of fighting that he had recently been through. The bleeding had mostly stopped and the gentle wind felt nice despite his open wounds, but he still craved the comfort of a soft bed.

Whoever was controlling those strange contraptions, he sincerely hoped that they had comfortable living spaces. If their advanced technology was any indication, he trusted that they would.

Looking over at his orbiting companion who had accompanied him throughout his walk, he took the time to inspect it a bit further. In a sense, he noticed that the machinery was not unlike his own automail. He looked over at his right arm to compare, but was met with the reminder that he had his regular arm back.

He was a bit surprised to find that he almost missed his automail arm, especially after remembering that his brother had essentially traded his own soul to bring his old one back. He clenched his fist, still in a bit of disbelief that it was there, vowing to beat down the Truth of this world, drag Alphonse's body and soul from his own Truth, and kick him for being so stupid.

Noticing movement in the corner of his eye, he noticed that the machine had started glowing again, this time with a bright green light, and was now flying upwards towards the sky.

Shrugging, he got up, clapped his hands together, and slammed them against the ground in a practiced fashion. He felt the ground rise up from beneath his feet as he followed the machine.

After a short while, the machine stopped ascending and floated in one spot, its green light now blinking off and on. Edward sat down on his perch, wondering about what was going to happen.

Peering off into the distance, all he could see was the horizon, but he noticed that he could hear something. He focused on the sound, but all he could hear was a strange roar. Curious about what the source could be, he strained his eyes towards the direction that the green light was being flashed towards. Seconds later he found it.

"Crap, crap, crap," he said as he slammed his hands down on the pillar he was standing on, quickly deconstructing his creation and allowing him to fall gently back on the ground. He didn't exactly know what that thing was, but if it wasn't friendly, it could easily kill him.

The black beast floated towards him at a breakneck speed, easily beating the size and intimidation factor of a tank. Edward panicked and slammed his hands into the ground once again, creating gigantic fists that shot out of the ground and towards the creature.

Once he took a second to think about what he was doing, his face flushed as he realized that it might be the thing that the contraption was signalling for. If it was friendly, than he just made an unnecessary enemy out of something that could easily kill him by walking in his general direction.

Surprisingly enough, the beast opened its mouth in response to the attack, revealing a frail looking blonde woman. Edward opened his mouth to warn the first human he had seen since arrival, but before he could, the woman almost casually waved a riding crop in the air with no hint of worry on her face. An instant later, the earthen fists seemed to shatter and glow with a purple aura, and gently float down to the ground.

Edward stared up, forgetting his initial fear in the awe of the powers that the woman displayed. It was nothing like he'd ever seen before. "Magic," he whispered to himself. Was this what Truth wanted him to find? It almost seemed to easy.

Bringing one of the earthen shards towards her with her telekinesis, she rotated it around and inspected it for any signs of it being infused with dust or aura. While she wouldn't call herself an expert on such matters, to her knowledge, the earthen fists that flew towards her were the genuine material. It was magic. This certainly changed things.

She looked down at the boy who stared up at her, wide-eyed and open-mouthed. Instinctively, she closed her legs a little tighter and adjusted her skirt.

She wondered what Ozpin would choose to do with him.

* * *

 **Hey there people, Chapter 2 of this thing. Who knows where this story is going to go? Not me!.. Seriously, I don't know. Look forward to the next chapter!**


	3. Chapter 3

"I really can't tell what you want with me until you tell me lady," Edward said casually as he leaned back in his chair. "Honestly, this is pretty much a kidnapping, just in case you didn't already know yourself."

The blonde woman gave him a glare that would have caused most people to shiver in fear, but Edward was no stranger to terrifying women. "My name is Glynda Goodwitch. I distinctly remember telling you this, but perhaps you were too occupied with resisting my attempts to get you onto the bullhead to listen."

"Bullhead?" Edward asked. He cursed inwardly when he saw that the woman, Glynda, had an equally confused expression. "Oh of course, you mean that flying monster that we travelled in right? Bullhead, huh? How did you even tame something so big anyways?"

When his only reply was a raised eyebrow. "What is your name?"

"Edward."

"Is that your family name?"

"No, Elric is my family name." Edward didn't fail to notice that either he was consistently saying strange things, or Glynda's personal hobby was to raise her eyebrows. He sighed, accepting the fact that he probably had no chance of pretending that he was from this world.

"Look, I'll be honest with you," Edward said, sighing and raising a hand in defeat. "I'm not from around here. I won't get into any details, but I'm here because I was sent to learn how things work around here."

Glynda nodded, surprising Edward with her understanding. "The first thing you might want to learn is that the bullhead is not an animal. It is a machine that was built by people and made specifically for flying."

"No way…" Edward said, leaning forward in his chair for the first time that night. "You mean humans are finally able to fly?"

Glynda simply stared at him. Perhaps her eyebrow muscles were too tired to display her surprise again. "With these machines, yes. People are capable of air travel."

"Ho boy," Edward said, slumping back in his chair. "I'm assuming you guys made those flying bird things too, huh?"

"Yes," Glynda said before abruptly pulling out a glowing panel of light. Edward peering over, his mouth hung open when he saw the panel contained miniature icons of light that Glynda seemed to bent to her will with only her fingers. Ignoring his shock, she tapped her fingers against the panel again and turned it off.

As she made her way towards the door, Edward called out to her. "How did you do that?"

"Please be patient, Mr. Elric. There is someone here who will answer your questions, as long as you answer some of his," she said, not turning around. Four knocks came from the other side and with a wave of her… riding crop, the door opened slowly.

"Why does everyone want to ask me questions before they answer mine? I guess here or there it's all the same," he grumbled, as he watched the doors opened at an uncomfortably slow pace. "Well, at least the purple glowy thing you did and that light panel are new. Can't say I've ever seen magic before."

"…Wha-"

"Edward Elric," a grey-haired man said as he walked into the room, setting down a plate of cookies. "You have golden eyes."

"Um…"

"So! Where did you learn to do this?"

"You've got to be a bit more specific than that, old man," Edward said, picking at his ear.

The man blinked a few times. "I meant, the way you seemed to shape the ground to your will of course. I've never seen anything like it and I'm very curious as to what the nature of your powers are."

"Oh wouldn't you like to know," Edward leered, finally understanding that he still had leverage in this discussion. "Well, you see old man, where I come from, there's this rule called 'Equivalent Exchange.' If you want something from me, it's only right that I get something in return."

"Very well, what is it that you want?"

"I want knowledge. Tell me everything there is to know about this world."

The man caught onto the eyebrows-raising trend. "Everything?"

"I guess that's a pretty tall order huh?" Edward said, leaning back in his chair and put his hands on the back of his head in an attempt to look as natural as possible. "I guess I'll start with the specifics. Got any problem with that, old man?"

"Yes, in fact I do," he said, surprising Edward. He wondered if he had pushed his luck too far. He clapped his hands together behind his head discretely, and prepared to transmute the nearest object.

"My name is not 'old man.' I would like you to refer to me as Professor Ozpin."

Ozpin remained unflinching even as Edward lost his balance and tumbled backwards, kicking up a small cloud of smoke. He instead elected to take a small sip of his coffee.

"Really?! That's all you wanted?!" Edward yelled as Ozpin just watched him with an amused expression. He almost moved to transmute something to destroy the mug in Ozpin's hands, but noticed that Glynda had taken notice and tensed up to fight. It seemed that the painfully slow moving door had finally closed again and she was no longer trapped between it and the wall.

"Yes, please," Ozpin confirmed.

Edward sighed and pulled up his chair. "Really, you're the worst interrogator I've ever seen in my life."

"You speak like someone whose met a lot of them," Ozpin noted, pushing the plate of cookies towards Edward.

"I guess you could say that. Could we actually make it a bit less like you're about to interrogate me now that we've established you're not any good at it?" Edward waved his hand around in the air. "This police light really isn't helping you convince me you're some friendly professor."

Ozpin nodded after a moment of thought and clapped his together twice. After a few seconds, a much warmer light filled the room.

"Great, more magic," Edward mumbled, failing to notice that Ozpin hid a spit-take to the best of his abilities. "Okay, now that we're comfortable, let's go in order. What was that thing that attacked me in the forest?"

Regaining his composure, Ozpin sat up straight. "That was an Ursa Minor, a subspecies of Grimm."

"I see, and what are these 'Grimm?'" Upon seeing his surprised face, Edward waved his hands. "You know what, that's not what I'm looking for. Let's just get on to the next item."

Holding his hand up, Ozpin spoke up. "Wait you mentioned that your lands had a law of equivalent exchange? Would it not be right to answer one of my questions before we move on?"

Edward clicked his tongue angrily. "Fine, Ozpin. What's your question?"

"Actually, now that you've mentioned it. I will change my question to a request."

"That's not exactly my idea of equivalent exchange," Edward said, frowning.

"Oh I'm sure it won't be a big deal," Ozpin said, leaning in on his chair. "I'm sure it wouldn't be a hard task for someone of your abilities."

Edward leant in on the table and rested his chin in his palm and gave a small grin, hoping that he looked as confident as he thought he did. "Let's hear it them."

"You called me Ozpin. I would like you to call me Professor Ozpin."

Edward felt his forehead hit the table as his chin slipped out from his palm. After a moment of silence, he sprung back to life. "Does everyone around here act like this?!" he yelled at Glynda, pointing at Ozpin who was now taking another sip of his coffee. Her only response was to sigh and solemnly shake her head.

"Now now, Mr Elric. I need to know whether you agree with these terms or not."

"You! Are you taking this seriously or not?!" he said, whipping his head around to the source of his stress. "Here I am, having risked my life to get here, bleeding out on your furniture, having to take in all weird crap that you people find to be normal and you're treating this as a joke?! I don't even know if you're a real teacher!"

"Would you like me to prove it to you?"

Edward paused for a moment. "What do you mean?" he asked, putting his anger aside for a second.

"I would like for you to enroll in my school as a first-year student," he said, ignoring the uncharacteristic sputtering of his vice principal. "I believe this will provide the both of us with ample opportunity to get what we want from each other. I promise that my facilities are one of the best when is comes to learning 'everything' there is to know about the world. Of course, this also means that you will be attending my school and as such, you will be referring to me as Professor Ozpin."

He sipped at his coffee once again. His mug was empty but he still did it for the aesthetic, though he doubted that either of the two blondes were lucid enough to fully care. He chuckled at the sight of them.

"Well either way, it wouldn't do for a student of mine to be so injured under my supervision. I suggest you head to the infirmary as soon as possible and get yourself healed." Pushing his chair back, he got up and left his vice principal, his new student, and the untouched plate of cookies.

* * *

"Ozpin. Never in my life have I been able to claim that I know what goes on in your head, but this time I know you've gone too far."

Ozpin frowned, disappointed that his colleague was so untrusting of his decisions. "James, I assure you that this is the best way to help all parties involved."

"Ozpin," the voice said sternly. He couldn't see him, but he knew that the General was probably pacing around the room, a nervous habit that he seemed to have whenever they discussed important matters. "Please explain to me how exposing a magic user to the public eye would be a good idea."

The creaking of the door alerted Ozpin to a new guest in his office, but the accompanying clacking of heels told him that it was a friend. "I would also like to know your thought process, sir. It is quite obvious that that boy's techniques are not normal, and considering that we are trying to hide people like him from our enemies, I can't see how having him as one of our students would prevent his discovery."

"Ah, Glynda. How is our newest student doing? Did you help him find the infirmary? Is he comfortable?" Ozpin asked, ignoring her concerns in a very practiced manner.

After failing to glare him down, Glynda sighed. "I made sure he was admitted to our infirmary, under the supervision of our head nurse. He was much more compliant than expected, but I assume that he was still under shock for the most part."

"Ah, good," he said, turning back towards the monitor that only displayed the name James Ironwood. "As you can see James, I have already invited the boy into my school as a student and I am sure he will accept my invitation."

He heard a frustrated sigh coming from the other end. "That's exactly my problem, Ozpin. Why is such a valuable person being put in so much danger?"

"Unlike the beliefs of many of the parents that unwillingly let their children study in combat schools, my school is one of the safest places in the kingdom."

"I don't mean it like that and you know it," Ironwood retorted. "Our enemies are dangerous, Ozpin. The Fall maiden lived a very secluded life and seldom used her powers at all, much less in public. If this boy really is using magic, it won't take long for the Queen to find him."

"I agree," Ozpin said, causing the other end of the line to go silent. Even Glynda gave a small start and turned to Ozpin, though neither of them spoke up. "As you said, our enemies are dangerous and powerful. Just as we have people out in the field, actively searching for the maidens, they have people as well. I have full confidence that Qrow is one of the strongest Huntsmen in the world, and in the field of tracking and espionage, I would even say he is the absolute best. But even then, our enemies found Amber, and they found her first. What's stopping them from finding our new friend, even if we put him into hiding?"

Ozpin waited a few moments for a reply from either of his listeners, but when he received no rebuttal, he continued.

"My point is, we are losing this war. We may have temporarily saved Amber, but they have half of her power. We don't even have a vague idea of how magic works, but they understand it well enough to take it by force. We need a trump card."

Ozpin heard a sigh coming from the other end, a sound he was all too familiar with. "I really can't win against you, can I?" Ironwood mused. "Can you at least explain to me why you're keeping him as a student then, rather than having hide himself as a staff member of civilian? I can understand that you want to keep him close, but Huntsman and Huntresses are under the constant scrutiny of the public view as protectors of the world and their students are generally under the same rule."

Ozpin relaxed and leant back in his chair. Though he knew that the person on the other end of the call would not be able to see his slight smile, but he trusted that James knew him well enough to assume it. "Mr. Elric wished to learn and before I am a protector of the world, I am a teacher."

A slight pause came from the other end. "I suppose it would be easier to control him if you can offer him what he wants."

"I am not controlling him, James. I am simply allowing him to do what he wishes."

"If you insist… very well then," Ironwood said, accepting Ozpin's word with confidence for the first time that night. "I will accept that you have this matter under control but please, be extra careful in guarding him. The last thing we need is a repeat of what happened to Amber. It was only a miracle that Qrow was able to arrive at the scene when he did."

At this note, Glynda decided to speak up. "Speaking of Qrow, James. The last time we got into contact with Qrow, he told us that he was headed towards Altas's direction. Were you able to contact him at all since then?"

"No, not at all," Ironwood said with a poorly masked grumble of annoyance. "He's impossible to get a hold of when he doesn't want to be found. I suppose we should be grateful for that, but I can't help but feel even more annoyed with him."

"Well, if you ever do get in contact with him, make sure you mention this new development," Ozpin said. "I'm sure he'll be able to make his own judgement on whether he should come back or stay in the field from there."

"I'll make sure to do that," Ironwood said. After a slight pause he spoke up again, this time with a little bit of concern in his voice. "Oh and Oz? Be careful. Introducing a new piece into the game is sure to mix things up."

"Of course," Ozpin replied. The words, James Ironwood, disappeared from the screen and the monitor turned off. Now that one of the problems was mostly dealt with, he resolved himself and turned around to face the other problem. "So Glynda, have you collected any information on Mr. Elric? As we are both well aware, he is definitely not from Vale, and may not be from any of the kingdoms."

Glynda nodded in confirmation. "We need to make a new identity for him. It is quite possible that he was living his whole life in the Grimmlands. While that might be an impossibility for most people, he may have been living there through the use of magic. That certainly would explain his wonder for basic technology and his strange name."

"I think the easiest identity we could forge for him would be to say he's from the outskirts of Vacuo, just bordering the Grimmlands." Ozpin said. "Being born in a lawless area would certainly explain his lack of official papers. As long as we inform him of this decision, it shouldn't be too hard of a lie to keep."

Glynda nodded again. "That is probably the best option for us at the moment," she said, pushing up her glasses. "But there's one more issue we have with Mr. Elric's understanding of the world. I suspect that he doesn't know he's using magic."

Ozpin nodded, took a sip from his mug, and let out a vague, "hmm." But otherwise, he didn't move to interrupt Glynda.

"He is convinced that my use of my semblance and my scroll were both displays of magic, and is unaware of the strange nature of his own powers. If he did, in fact, live his life in the Grimmlands, he may have not known anything besides magic, and to him it is normal."

"Hmm… no matter," Ozpin said. "He may receive yet another culture shock, but he has to know about the special nature of his powers eventually. In fact, we will have to educate him quickly on how to disguise his magic as a semblance if he ever wants to use it in combat."

"There's still the problem of enrolling him into our school," Glynda continued. "As you know, we accept students in groups of four and an extra student at this time would just cause an uneven number."

"Oh don't worry about that Glynda," Ozpin said, resulting in a questioning look from Glynda. "I think that in this case we can bend the rules just a little bit. It's a bit impromptu, but I think he could fit in easily with the two special cases we have already."

"Do you mean Ms. Nikos and Ms. Rose?" Glynda asked.

Ozpin smiled and without confirming her suspicions, he turned around in his chair. "This will be a very interesting year," he said as he took a sip from his mug.

* * *

 **Pretty short chapter this time around, though this means that most of the set-up for the setting and the exposition is done and we can get into the meat of this thing. Which will hopefully be fun.**

 **To answer a question about pairings in the reviews, Edward will not be paired with anyone since he already has a honey back home. The rest of the RWBY characters are up in the air, though I doubt this will ever be romance/pairing-focused.**

 **Speaking of reviews, thanks for the kind words people. I'm glad that you all think this is interesting. Special shoutout to mocasiotorres27 for enjoying my humor. I didn't think my terrible sense of humor would translate well to writing and I'm very glad to hear that at least one person enjoyed it.**

 **Speaking of terrible humor, here's a little extra that may or not be canon to my story.**

* * *

"Glynda, how does our budget report look like?"

"We're barely staying out of debt, sir."

Ozpin frowned. "That can't be right. The government has funded us handsomely to keep Vale and Remnant protected. Are you sure, that's right?"

"Yes sir," Glynda replied, flipping through the pages in her arms. "I've checked through it very thoroughly and am confident that I haven't made any mistakes in calculation. However, I actually wanted to ask you about some strange purchases here that may be the reason for this financial problem."

Ozpin looked back at her curiously. "Yes, ask away. Let's get to the bottom of this."

"Ahem," Glynda opened a specific page with a bright red tab sticking out. "I have a list here that lists out all the purchases the school has made under the category of 'Necessities.' I recognize that some of these items were purchased and filed under codenames in order to provide for Amber's care and protection, but I do not recognize the codenames for some of these purchases."

Ozpin nodded. "Continue. I might recognize them."

"The first codename I do not recognize is 'clappers.'"

"Ah," Ozpin said as he spontaneously started to sweat. "That is the codename for… the parts necessary to build the automatic defense system that we have planned for the Amber Chamber."

"Sir, we already agreed that we should minimize the amount of electronic devices in Amber's vicinity. The risk of anyone remotely accessing them is one that we cannot take."

"Oh you misunderstand, this Amber Chamber is entirely free of electronics. Have you ever seen 'Indigo Jones?'"

"Sir I simply cannot believe that you would install such a thing in Amber's room… probably."

"It's the name of the guard dog I bought for the Amber Chamber?"

"I doubt a dog could stop someone who has the partial power of a maiden, incomplete it may be. Not to mention it's barking could give away the location of Amber's hideaway."

"…"

"… you bought actual clappers."

"Now listen Glynda, on average, three million kilocalories are used to get up and turn lights on or off every year. With clappers, we can reduce that energy expenditure by ninety percent! Think of what our students could do with all that energy!"

Her only response was to clutch her head and walk away, leaving Ozpin alone in the halls.

"Glynda?" Ozpin begged, reaching out towards her, but not daring to follow her and ask for forgiveness. "Please reply…"

When the sounds of heels against hard floor started to fade away, Ozpin crumpled to his knees. Petrified by the fear of what passive aggressiveness laid in store for him the next week.

"At least call it the Amber Chamber."


	4. Chapter 4

**So I'm not dead. That's good, right?**

 **I'm trying to gradually make longer chapters in addition to reading it over a few times to try and smooth out the awkwardly worded bits, but the delay between this chapter and the last wasn't because of that extra effort and won't be representative of future update times… hopefully. The delay in writing this chapter was more because of the massive amounts of work I had to do for my projects. Who said school was easier during the summer?**

 **I also don't know how to dialogue. That probably won't change for a while.**

* * *

Edward remained cross-legged on his bed as he stared down at the metal object placed neatly in front of him, occasionally poking it to confirm that it was real. After a while, he decided that he had enough and gave up on trying to understand how it worked. It would be much easier to accept it for what it was.

Even after Glynda had given him a short explanation as to what a scroll was and what it did, it didn't stop him from being confused by its very existence. As an alchemist, he had a desire to know how everything worked. Even though he knew some things simply could not be explained, he refused to acknowledge that this 'scroll' was one of them.

Unfortunately, he hadn't had a chance to ask anybody about the specific details on how it worked. Glynda had shut down his attempts at asking questions by simply asking her own questions about himself, writing his answers down with a clipboard in hand. After she had asked him for his gender, he assumed that she was asking him these questions for the sake of forging him some official documents. When he asked her about it, she simply nodded in confirmation.

"You technically do not exist Mr. Elric," she said before asking for his full name, even though he doubted that she had forgotten it. "Beacon Academy accepts students from all walks of life, but even the students with a mysterious past have a record. Even those who were born in the slums of the darkest city have a birthplace or connections with other people in some sort. You have none of that Mr. Elric, which is why we need to make an origin for you."

Edward nodded after listening to her explanation. "You look like you're used to this. Is this something you do for all your students?" he asked jokingly, though he hadn't expected a response. It didn't take long for him to be able to tell that Glynda wasn't the type to joke around, especially when it would interrupt her work.

"Any history of disease or health complications?" she asked, not bothering to look up from her clipboard or acknowledging his question.

"None," he replied.

A few moments of silence had passed before Edward looked up to see Glynda looking at him with a slightly confused expression.

"Are mechanical limbs not considered to be a health hazard?" she asked, gesturing to his exposed leg.

Edward gave a shrug. "Sorry. Sometimes I just forget that it is."

With a short "hmm," she wrote something down on the clipboard. "Just to let you know, mechanical limbs are not very common here, despite what your experiences may be. It might be wise for you to hide it lest you stand out even more. There's no need to keep it an absolute secret, but there is less of a reason to reveal it carelessly."

Taking only a few moments to confirm that Edward had nodded in agreement, she continued to ask questions. "Age?"

"16," he replied, finally giving up on asking her more questions. A few seconds passed and he noticed that she hadn't written down anything on the paper, breaking the routine they had been keeping for the past few minutes. A closer look at her face told him that she was thinking about something that he wasn't too sure of.

"Birthday?" she finally asked, breaking the silence.

"February 3," he replied. He was surprised to see that her immediate reaction was to sigh.

"Though it would be more convenient of you were 17 years old, I suppose it won't complicate things much further than they already have been," she said, not really addressing him directly.

"Why is that?" he asked, slightly surprised that she would be the one to break the monotonous line of questioning and answering.

"Beacon students are typically 17 years old when they enroll into the school, when they legally become adults. Of course there are sometimes cases where students are enrolled at an early age, but most parents would not want their children in a school that will eventually force them to risk their lives for the good of the people." Edward had raised his eyebrow at her comment, but she hadn't seemed to notice his reaction in any way. "If the parents have no legal custody, it is a much simpler matter at that point."

Edward stopped himself before he asked her to elaborate on her previous statement, deciding that it could be saved for later.

"We want to keep you as low profile as possible, but what is being enrolled early going to do at this point? It would be easier to use your true age instead of a false one," she finalized to herself. She continued to move her pen towards the next item on her checklist.

"Height?"

"5…" Edward started to say before freezing in his tracks, almost biting his tongue in an effort to stop himself from saying his height out loud. A quick glance to the left had told him that Glynda had definitely noticed his unusual behaviour. She met his gaze and tapped at her clipboard expectantly.

"C'mon Edward," he thought to himself, giving a quick grin to the blonde teacher in an attempt to assure her that everything was alright. "You've grown taller, a lot taller! You're at a normal height for most guys your age, it's just that you're always hanging out with giant freaks of nature. You have no reason to keep this silly trauma of yours… haha… no reason at all."

"Mr. Elric," a sharp voice said, snapping him out of his internal monologue. "Is anything wrong?"

"Of course not! There's no way I would have a height complex, that's ridiculous," he yelled both out loud, trying to convince her like how he was trying to convince himself.

Glynda's eyes had widened in surprise before narrowing into a glare. "Mr. Elric, I hope you understand that for some of your new identification documents, a height measurement will be required," she said, slowly standing up from her chair. "If you do not tell me, I'll be forced to measure your height myself."

Edward looked up to the woman in fear as he tried to make himself as small as possible. "Now, now, Glynda. I'm an injured student. There's no way you would force me to do something as strenuous as standing up, right? You could be reported for abuse of authority."

Her only response was to involuntarily twitch her eye and raise her riding crop, covering both him and a nearby length of measuring tape in a soft purple glow. "Now Mr. Elric," she said, ignoring Edward's pleas for mercy as he floated up to the measuring tape. "You are not yet my student, so you should not worry about such matters."

With a sharp crack as her riding crop hit the air, Edward's body straightened up despite his will. "However, when you do become a proper student I expect a proper greeting. You will refer to me as Professor Goodwitch."

Edward let out a small scream as he sat up in his bed in a cold sweat, the recent memory of the traumatic event fresh in his mind. Looking around, he saw a room, empty of his hallucinations and immediately calmed down.

Even after he calmed down, he still had a little trouble remembering the rest of the conversation. Even after accounting for the mental trauma that he received, he was simply tired. Despite this, he tried his best to remember and go over Gly- Professor Goodwitch's instructions.

Keep the scroll on his person at all times. He was told that it could be used as access card to all the student facilities, as well as allowing him to contact others at any time. While he still remained impressed at the powers of the strange object, his awe didn't stop him from discerning that if he could contact others with the scroll, there was no doubt that Ozpin or Goodwitch could easily contact or locate him through the device. Even if that was the case, he decided that he would probably follow their instructions and keep it on his person. It seemed convenient enough and it wasn't a difficult task to follow. Even if he eventually decided to do something that would require a bit of sneaking and subterfuge, the scroll wasn't permanently attached to him in any way.

Do not use alchemy unless it's a last resort. He could easily assume that alchemy was non-existent in this world before he had arrived and he wouldn't have been surprised if they wanted to monopolize this new power. He wasn't a stranger to being used as a human weapon and though he was never fond of the experience, he was willing to do whatever was necessary to go back to his world and bring his brother's soul from beyond the Gate. Unfortunately, Goodwitch had refused to explain their intentions any further, promising that Ozpin would be the one to explain and teach him what he wanted. So while he trusted that his assumption that they wanted him as a human weapon was accurate, he had no way of confirming that thought.

Never reveal his true identity. He would still be "Edward Elric," but he was informed to not tell anyone of his unexplainable origins and use the details of his false biography instead. He had found it a bit strange that neither Ozpin nor Goodwitch had actually asked him about his true origins, but he supposed that he should be grateful for that.

Searching through his mind one last time, he failed to remember anything else that Goodwitch had told instructed him about.

He fell back as the brief rush of adrenaline quickly faded away, sighing as he was met with the familiar sight of a pale white hospital ceiling. He felt relatively fine but the doctors and nurses hadn't agreed with him. After a short examination with some equipment that was familiar and some tools that weren't, they had stared at him with wide eyes and rushed him into his current room.

Normally he would have resisted, but he could tell that the infirmary staff were genuinely concerned for his health. Even if they weren't, there wasn't really anything he could do. As mysterious as Ozpin was, he was his only chance to gather information about this new world and running away would only put him in a worse position. Besides, he was no stranger to being a prisoner. If anything, it was a fresh experience to be put under house arrest simply for his health.

After a few days that involved fighting what was essentially a god and his subordinates, diving into an entirely new world, and going through what seemed more like an interrogation than a health interview, Edward could barely keep his eyes open. Even as he stared at the uncomfortably bright ceiling, he felt his consciousness fade away. He thought about turning off the light and closing the curtains, but he couldn't find the energy to complete either task. As he turned to the side, he took note of the broken moon despite the glare of the light on the glass of the window and reached out for it subconsciously, as if it held the secrets to the Truth of this strange world.

He barely lifted his arm off the bed before he fell asleep, his arm falling lazily off the edge and his open window leaking light into the night sky.

* * *

Ruby Rose struggled to hold back a yawn as she knocked on team JNPR's door. Though she tried to knock softly, the sound of her knuckles echoed through the dark hallway. It took a few moments for her to hear any sort of response, but eventually she heard a few groans and the soft dragging of feet from inside the room. Still trying to rub the sleep out of her eyes, she lazily raised her free arm in a greeting as the door opened. Despite the fact that crimson hair fell over and covered half of her face, Pyrrha was able to return Ruby's tired smile and wave with her own.

"Hello Pyrrha," Ruby said.

"Hello Ruby," she replied, leaning against the doorway. "Is there anything I can help you with?"

"Yeah, can you wake up Jaune? I figured he wouldn't have woken up from the sound of his scroll going off," Ruby elaborated, slightly marvelling at Pyrrha's polite reply. She didn't doubt that if any of her teammates were woken at 4:00 A.M. their reactions would not be nearly as peaceful. "I got a message from Ozpin. Said he needed me and Jaune to go to his office immediately," she explained as she noticed Pyrrha blinking blankly in confusion.

With a small nod, she turned back into the room, leaving Ruby to valiantly battle sleep in the empty hallway. Thankfully, right before she felt like finally giving in to her opponent, back up came from JNPR's room.

"Hey Ruby, sorry for the wait," Jaune said as he yawned wide, not bothering to cover his mouth. Ruby didn't seem to mind the lack of manners as her attention was completely focused on her battle against the increasing desire to lie down. She nodded and motioned towards the direction of Ozpin's office in an effort to keep quiet and conserve her already low energy. Jaune didn't seem to mind and he followed the direction of her thumb wordlessly, not bothering to stifle any yawns or grunts. Though the duo had to occasionally prevent the other from going in a wrong direction mindlessly, they eventually arrived at the elevator that would connect them to the headmaster's office.

As they rode up, Jaune spoke up, finally breaking the impromptu vow of silence that they had made. "So Ruby, I know I should've asked earlier, but why are we going to meet Ozpin so late at night again?"

"I don't know either." Ruby shrugged. "Maybe it's some important team leader meeting?"

"We didn't exactly see anyone else though," Jaune said slowly as his mind struggled to warm up. "I know it took a while for me to get up, but we should have seen other leaders walking around too."

"I don't know Jaune. Maybe it's some important team RWBY and JNPR leader meeting?" she said, offering the best answer that her tired brain could muster.

"I guess…" Jaune trailed off, realizing that his mind hadn't woken up to bother arguing against Ruby's suggestion. "Well whatever it is, hopefully Ozpin will just tell us quickly and we can go back to sleep."

Ruby gave a small 'mhmm' as the door opened to the highest point of Beacon.

Seeing as nobody else was immediately outside the elevator doors, they both looked at each other in confusion but stepped into the hallway regardless, letting the metal doors close behind them. They stood in silence for a few moments before Ruby broke it.

"Wow, now that I'm here I'm suddenly getting nervous," she said, looking around at the unfamiliar room. "It kind of makes me feel small, just being here."

"You mean smaller than you already are?" Jaune chuckled as he waved down Ruby in a preemptive attempt at stopping her inevitable retaliation.

"Jaaaune. Not nice," she said, pouting slightly as the older boy's teasing. "It's rude to make fun of someone's height like that. It's not like I can do anything about it."

"Sorry Ruby. Just thought it would make you feel a little less nervous," he said with a small smile. "But yeah, I get what you mean. It's like I'm just one tiny cog in an elaborate mechanism that I can't hope to understand." Jaune yawned and stretched his neck, tilting his head upward to gaze lazily at the ceiling.

Following suit, Ruby gave her own yawn in response but when Jaune didn't avert his gaze from the sky she followed his gaze, curious as to what could be so interesting about the ceiling. She blinked a few times in confusion but in a relatively quick moment of realization, she turned to Jaune with a deadpan expression. He was no longer looking at the giant cogs in the ceiling, but was instead looking at her as he gave a futile attempt at stopping himself from grinning.

"Haha very funny, Jaune," Ruby said sarcastically, wondering if saying lame things was a trait that was common in all blondes.

Before Jaune could respond in any way besides giggling, the small *ding* of the elevator and a sharp tapping alerted the teens to a new presence behind them and reminded Ruby of the prime example of a blonde that could completely disprove her previous theory.

"Mr. Arc, Ms. Rose. Please follow me to the headmaster's office," Glynda said, ignoring the fact that Jaune had seemingly attempted to wipe the goofy smile off his face in the most literal manner possible, morphing it into an expression of nervous fear in a clumsy battle of hand versus face.

As Glynda walked past them, she barely looked at them and kept her gaze focused on the door at the end of the hallway as Ruby and Jaune both followed after her.. When they finally entered the room furthest away from the elevator, they were met with the scent of coffee and the sight of Ozpin melodramatically staring out his window, seemingly staring at the scenic view of Beacon and its surroundings as he sipped away at whatever was in his mug.

"I have brought Ms. Rose and Mr. Arc," Glynda announced.

It took a few seconds before Ozpin gave any indication that he had heard her or even that he knew he was not alone in his room, but that moment passed quickly and Ozpin let out a small sigh.

"Ms. Rose, Mr. Arc. Leaders of team RWBY and JNPR," he said, turning away from the window and moving towards his desk. "How have the first few days of Beacon been treating you?" Ruby and Jaune both looked at each other in confusion.

"Good?" Ruby offered hesitantly. "It's only been two days, but I've made a few friends so I guess that's good… Also I'm surprised that Professor Port brought a live Grimm into class, so I'm pretty excited to see what the other teachers have in store for us."

"And you Mr. Arc?" he asked, turning to face the young man.

"Umm, it's amazing," he said a bit unconfidently. "I mean, we haven't really done much since initiation yet, but even being here is like a dream come true… I guess."

At that, Ozpin nodded, turning away towards the window once again.

"Those are both fine points," he said, pausing only to take a sip of what Ruby and Jaune now assumed to be coffee, despite the late hours. "Beacon is a place of learning and discovery and every student accepted here has the opportunity to experience that to its fullest in exchange for the promise of becoming someone who will ensure the safety of humanity's future. If accepting someone to this school would ensure the safety of future generations, there is no reason on Remnant that would make me refuse them."

Nodding towards the window as Ruby and Jaune watched, he turned back to them and sat down in his chair.

"I called you up here today in order to ask a favour," he said, causing the duo to perk up. "Today, a new student of Beacon arrived on our grounds. He's the student of an old friend of mine who I promised to have him accepted into our school. However, I'm embarrassed to say that I forgot to accommodate for the extra student and as a result I have no team to place him on."

"While this may be a bit unorthodox, I'm requesting that you adopt our new student into your respective teams. As I understand, your two teams have already made close bonds with each other and attend the same classes so adding one more to your extended family should not pose to be too big of a problem. In addition to this, our new student is a bit younger than our general student population. Something you may be able to relate to Ms. Rose?"

Ruby's eyes brightened up at the reveal of this new fact. She was still a bit annoyed and confused at the fact that Ozpin had called them up so early in the morning for this new announcement, but the chance at making a new friend easily outweighed the sleep deprivation. "Really? How old is he? What's his name? Does he have any cool weapons?"

Ozpin smiled as he leaned back in his chair. "He is 16 years old, his name is Edward Elric, and as far as I know, he does not seem to carry any traditional weapons on his person. I have yet to see him fight, but I trust that he is quite the capable fighter. But perhaps I shouldn't be the one to tell you about his life's story," he said, cutting off any further questions.

"Oh, that's so cool! So mysterious. I mean it would be even cooler if he did have a weapon, but I suppose it's cooler to see how he fights rather than someone else telling me. Oh! Maybe I could help make him a weapon! I mean, I guess if he doesn't use one already he won't need one, but that doesn't mean a weapon wouldn't help. And I'd be more than willing to help out a friend!" she exclaimed, waving her hands animatedly. When she finally stopped to draw a breath, she readied herself to continue talking about the possible schematics for a weapon that could allow for the efficient storage and ejection of dust crystals while still keeping a practical form, but the awkward expression on Jaune's face stopped her.

"Oh sorry," she said, blushing as she realised the extent of her rambling. "I kind of never stop talking when it comes to weapons. I have a lot to say about them."

Ozpin only gave a light chuckle in response. "I suppose we should be grateful to have such an enthusiastic student in our school. Perhaps our new friend will be grateful as well." He turned to look over at Jaune once again. "So Mr. Arc. We can assume Ms. Rose's response from her excitement, but you haven't given your opinion yet. Will team JNPR be willing to accept a new student into their family?"

It took Jaune a moment to realize that he was the focus of Ozpin's attention before he replied. "Of course, sir!" he answered, more than willing to help a student. More so if it meant that he could help someone avoid the feeling of being denied from their dream school. "You can count on me."

"Perfect," Ozpin said, clasping his hands together. "Now our newest addition will be staying in his own room close to your own dorms, but I encourage you interact as much as possible in order to make him feel welcome. Unfortunately, he won't be in his room tonight, but I assure you he will be out of the infirmary by tomorrow morning."

Ruby's eyes widened at this casual comment. "He's in the infirmary for a night?" she asked, shocked that her newest not-friend-yet-but-he-might-as-well-be friend was injured before she even met him. "What happened?"

"Nothing to worry about Ms. Rose. It was a quite a treacherous journey to travel here from his hometown and he has sustained a few injuries and is exhausted of aura, but it is nothing serious," Ozpin answered calmly, waving down her concerns. "He merely needs a good night's rest and though his aura exhaustion may pose a problem, he just needs a few days without any strenuous activity and it should return to normal."

Ruby and Jaune looked at each other briefly.

"Is there anything we can do to help him, sir?" Jaune asked.

Ozpin smiled. "No doubt, Edward will be quite hungry when he wakes up and the food they serve in the infirmary leaves much to be desired. Maybe you could bring him a nice breakfast from the cafeteria while you introduce yourselves and your team to him tomorrow morning?"

* * *

"So yeah, that's the story," Ruby said as she begrudgingly put a few doze cookies back from where she got them. Despite her complaints and the claims that Ozpin had done the same for her when they first met, Yang had calmly explained that having a sugar overdose was not included in the perfect breakfast package.

"I've never heard of a case where an extra student was added to a team in the middle of the year before, let alone two teams," the blonde tyrant mused as she watched to make sure that Ruby was actually putting the cookies back in their original spot and not into her mouth. "How would that even work? One team gets him on Monday to Wednesday, the other gets him on Thursday to Saturday, and we alternate every Sunday?"

"Don't talk like you're getting some sort of toy," Weiss retorted in an annoyed tone of voice. "Professor Ozpin has entrusted that we include this student into our teams and we should be honored that he entrusted our teams with this task personally."

At this point, Pyrrha spoke up from behind their group. "Actually, Yang does bring up a good point. I'm curious as to how our team dynamics will change now that we're technically sharing an extra team member."

"Ooh, ooh, do you think we're gonna get a team name change?" Nora asked excitedly, bouncing up and down in excitement. "Imagine the potential names we could have with five letters! We could be… umm… what was the transfer student's name again?"

"I think it was something like Edward Elric?" Jaune answered uncertainly as he reached over for a sandwich and placed it onto the tray that Ruby was holding, even as she whined softly about the fact that she enjoyed having "RWBY" as her team name.

At this point, a few eyebrows were raised.

"Are you sure Ozpin said that was his name, Jaune?" Pyrrha asked.

Jaune looked like he couldn't decide between shrugging and nodding. "I mean, I'm pretty sure that's what he said, but it's a pretty weird name right? I mean, the only people who aren't named after a color are the ones who were alive before the Great War, and I'm sure he's not that old."

"Yeah of course not. In fact, he's only sixteen years old. He's been accepted to the school early, just like me!" Ruby chimed in. "Now can someone help me with this tray before I spill it all over the floor?" she asked sheepishly as she gestured towards her shaking arms, unsteady against the weight of the tray that the rest of her friends had been continuously piling food onto for the past few minutes.

"No problem, Rubes," Yang said as she took the tray into her own hands, balancing it carefully so that nothing spilled. "Why do we need to bring this much food anyways?"

"We do not know anything about this new friend of ours, much less his dietary needs and preferences," Ren answered. "Obviously, we can't expect him to eat everything, but we can increase the chance that we are bringing him something he enjoys."

"Or he could eat it all!" Nora said, eyes wide. "That would be so funny!"

Despite the incredulous stares, the smile failed to fall off her face as she imagined some shadowy figure eating all of the food that they brought in one bite, using the tray as an impromptu shovel-spoon.

Once they arrived at the infirmary a few of the members slipped away to find any receptionist or nurse who may know the location of their new teammate.

"Hey everyone, I managed to find out where this guy is," Blake called out as she came back, having been the first to find a nurse that could give her directions despite the fact that they had no descriptions to describe. The group started to march towards the direction that she pointed in, leaving Nora to bask in her own imagination as she continued to laugh at the cartoonish movie of the new student that was currently playing in her mind.

Ruby soon found herself standing in front of the door with the rest of her friends behind her, aside from Nora who was still where they had left her. She looked back awkwardly as they all looked at her expectantly. Sighing, she accepted her fate as the vanguard of the group and knocked on the door.

A few moments of silence passed before the group heard a faint, "come in." Opening the door, she walked in, momentarily holding the door open for Yang whose hands were preoccupied with the giant tray of food she held. It was only after she ensured that the food she had so painstakingly gathered had safely entered the room, along with Yang, that she turned around to actually see her new teammate for the first time.

Golden eyes met her own silver eyes as he looked at her, with an expression of slight confusion and expectation. She smiled awkwardly as he looked away to analyze the newer arrivals, his confusion only growing as the amount of people filing in threatened to overflow the relatively small room.

"Hi, I'm Ruby," she said, hoping that it would provide some sort of explanation as to why a group of strangers was suddenly visiting him by his bedside. Ignoring the questioning look she received in response, she held out her hand. "You're Edward, right? It's nice to meet you."

"Umm, yeah," he said, uncertainly shaking the offered hand. "Nice to meet you too."

"And I'm her sister, Yang," said the blonde in question. She didn't offer her hand due to her lack of freedom, but moved over to the bedside drawer instead, placing the tray of food down with a soft thud.

"I'm Jaune," the final blonde said, following suit and giving a slight wave.

The rest of the party copied the motion and gave their names and a small greeting, with the exception of Nora, who instead burst into the room shouting, "NORA!" with the impeccable timing to cut Ren off. Once the greeting circle looped back to Ruby, she looked expectantly at the bandaged boy who seemed to be infinitely more confused than he had been when she first entered the room.

"Umm I'm really sorry, but I still have no idea what you're doing in my room," he said as inoffensively as possible.

"Aww don't be so harsh. What's the harm in saying hi to a future classmate?" Yang asked. She was pleasantly rewarded as a look of clarity crossed the boy's face for the first time.

Riding off the good vibe, Ruby excitedly jumped in. "Not only are we classmates, we're also going to be teammates! And I," Ruby exclaimed, emphasizing the 'I' a bit more than necessary. "Am your fearless leader of team RWBY!" she finished, failing to notice the sudden change in his expression, back into one of confusion.

"Team?" he asked.

Hearing this, Ruby fumbled with her pose a bit before catching herself and looking at his face again to see a renewed confusion. Before she could speak up about it, she was cut off by the oblivious Jaune.

"And I'm also your team leader of team JNPR," he said, pausing a little as he fully registered what he just claimed. "Wait, how does that even work?"

Quickly cutting his leader off before he continued to clumsily try and piece the new team dynamics together, Ren spoke up. "We welcome you to Beacon," he said, taking initiative as the only other male in the group in an attempt to ensure that the new student won't feel isolated in the predominantly female group. "I hope to entrust my life with you in the field, and I hope you will come to trust me with yours in the future."

Despite the slight surprise she felt at the normally quiet Ren speaking up, Ruby found her words again and turned back to ask the new student about why he looked so confused, but she was surprised to find him with a look of tired understanding on his face.

Edward sighed internally. Despite the grim implications that Professor Goodwitch had mentioned about the students risking their lives for the people, he had still hoped that this was a normal school and that he could pursue his quest for this world's Truth in relative peace. But with his luck, that was impossible. It seemed like he'd be a human weapon in this world as well. He chuckled a bit at the thought.

Still, he could see that none of the people around him had any bad intentions and even if the school was related to the military in any way, it didn't make a difference. There was also the possibility that this was the complete norm in this world. Maybe all the students in this world calmly talked about entrusting their lives to their 'teams' as if it was as common as eating.

His stomach grumbled at the mere thought of eating, lightly enough for only him to hear, though he swore the hyperactive girl, Nora, stared at him excitedly like she had found a kindred spirit. He looked up at the group to find kind faces staring back. "Well it could be worse," he thought to himself.

"I hope we all get along," he said, smiling for the first time since they entered. "Also, thanks for the food. I haven't eaten for two days and I'm starving," he explained as he reached over for a sandwich.

"WHAT!?" Nora exclaimed, as thought of not eating for so long invaded her mind and her knees gave out from beneath her.

* * *

 **I had a bit of an issue with the pretty OOC reactions that Ed has when meeting RWBYJNPR, but after going through a bit of the manga, I realized that Ed has pretty much three types of introductions to new people unless he starts fighting them the first time they meet.**

 **He's always: Completely afraid of them; Sarcastic and super pissed at them; or Uses flattery and is incredibly fake.**

 **The problem with this is that in each of these scenarios, he's always given a huge reason to react in this way. They're terrifying, say some comment that makes him angry whether it's intentional or not, or is dealing with someone he wants to use. He's never introduced to someone that does something kind for him from the very beginning, so we don't really see how he would react in this kind of scenario.**

 **Despite my pathetic attempts at justification, I recognize that Ed is completely OOC as he is pretty awkward and stiff in the scene. Unfortunately, I'm a pretty garbo writer and instinctively think of what "someone" would do in a scenario where they find themselves in a pretty awkward situation like this one rather then what the character would do. I promise I'll work on that, but getting better is a gradual progress.**

 **So there's that.**

* * *

 **I like opinions. I feed off opinions. Please give them to me through PM, review, fax, etc. You wouldn't want me to starve would you?**

* * *

 **Fun stuff I just wanted to mention.**

 **After researching a few things about both RWBY and FMA, I was actually surprised at a few of the things I found.**

 **Firstly, Ed doesn't have a confirmed birthdate, but a quick google search told me of two "official" birthdays of October 11 and February 3. I just used the one that would make it so that he's younger year than the rest of the cast sans Ruby. Did I need to do that? Nope. I just wanted to make him younger so that I could use his younger age to make him more relatable to Ruby if need be. No really important plans for it and it may never be important, but it's out there now.**

 **Second of all, even though he starts of being 4-foot something, Ed has a pretty average height by the end of the series with the wiki saying that he's around 5'6" which I wasn't too surprised at, but I had to check the heights of the RWBY characters if I wanted to use Ed's iconic height complex.**

 **What the hell do these people eat to be so tall? Why the hell do the taller women wear heels? According to the RWBY height chart, Pyrrha is 6'0", Jaune is 6'1", Glynda is 6'7" and Ozpin is also around the same. However, this doesn't apply to everyone and the majority of the cast have heights that range from short to average. This probably means that Ed's height complex might not make that many appearances, which honestly I'm quite grateful for. I don't have any confidence that I could use it tastefully and I think that if I used it improperly it would either be overplayed and cheesy.**

 **This doesn't mean it's off the table though. Yang is slightly taller than Ed at 5'7" and I feel like she'd be someone to casually call him shorty as a one-off joke or something. Mercury and Sun and pretty significantly taller than Edward and both would be the type to mention his height offhandedly. Don't expect me to rely on it though. I never really liked it too much anyways.**

 **Also I didn't remember that the Jaunedice episodes supposedly took place weeks after the start of the school. The time-skip isn't very obvious and unimportant.**

 **Nothing else interesting to note.**


	5. Chapter 5

**Hey people, quick update on the progression of the story.**

 **Long story short, after uploading chapter 4 a few weeks ago I started to brainstorm about what I could write in chapter 5. I got pretty excited at the ideas I thought of and I'm really excited to write more, but I realized that I can't just blindly write with this kind of story.**

 **Up until this point, I've been writing without a plan. To be honest, I don't really have a good ending lined up for this story and while I do have some general ideas about some events that are going to happen, there's no blueprint or path that my story is currently following. That's fine for some stories that are episodic or rely on comedy or something similar, but after I dragged Ed into the "big picture" of RWBY which is the magic warfare between the good and bad guys, I realize that my story needs a bit more planning than I had initially thought. As a result, the time it will take for me to upload the next chapter might be a bit longer than I would hope for, but if everything goes well the chapters after that won't be too affected.**

 **While I did promise that I would be rereading and rechecking to ensure the story has decent grammar and flow, I'll be checking further for story congruency and to ensure that a certain set of rules are followed.**

 **However, I'm a dirty liar so here's this chapter that I wrote haphazardly within two days.**

 **In addition to this, I will make a slight edit to chapter four to make Ozpin claim that he doesn't know Ed's semblance. I had an idea for an actual semblance that Ed could have. It would make sense for Ozpin to assume that Ed has a semblance that he either hasn't shown or hasn't discovered.**

* * *

Soft steps echoed slightly across the mostly empty halls of Beacon Academy as three students made their way to class. They were late, but with a valid reason given to them by the headmaster, even the most strict and punctual one amongst them did not feel the need to rush. Albeit, she was concerned about missing a few fights in combat class that she could be learning from, but after a short consideration she had easily convinced herself that guiding the new student was a more important task and that pushing him to hurry was not a wise decision, especially when he was injured.

Weiss looked over at Edward, who had just finished changing into his school uniform and had joined them in their walk to Professor Goodwitch's combat class. He looked a bit uncomfortable as he walked along and she didn't envy him. It was rare to see a Hunter, or even a Hunter-in-training, so heavily depleted of Aura that they couldn't heal superficial wounds such as the ones that he had. She wondered briefly about what he could have been doing to be so drained of Aura, but she quickly shook herself out.

"So Edward, how have you been finding Beacon so far?" she asked politely.

"Huh?" he replied, offhandedly. "Well, the only thing I know about this is that it has creepy interrogation rooms and how many cracks are in the ceiling of my infirmary room. So I don't really have a solid opinion yet."

Weiss raised an eyebrow, despite his casual response. "Interrogation room?"

Edward shrugged. "Were you not supposed to know that?" he asked disinterestedly. "Well, Ozpin didn't really say anything about it, so I figured students got interrogated all the time."

"Umm, well," Weiss started, uncertain about what to do or say with this new information.

"Oh don't worry about that," Ruby said, piping up from beside Weiss. "I got interrogated too! Maybe it's something he reserves for the younger students." She ignored the sounds of distress that came from Weiss as she revealed this new information.

"Glad to see I'm not the only one," he said, turning his attention to the long hallway. "Any idea how much longer we'll be walking? This place is a lot bigger than I thought it would be."

"Yes, Beacon is one of the best schools in all of Remnant and its facilities reflect that," Weiss said after recovering from the recent revelation that her partner had done something that would require interrogation as a follow-up. She would ask about that later. "Right now we're headed to the training arenas at the far edge of campus." She could have sworn that Edward had sighed at the very mention of the training arenas, but thought nothing of it.

"And what will we be doing in the training arenas?" Edward asked with a hint of something that sounded like hope.

"Combat class, of course," she replied.

Edward paused for a second before he spoke up again. "Can I ask something?" The hope seemed to be replaced by something like resignation. Weiss frowned a bit as she noticed this, but she ignored her suspicions. "By combat class do you mean self defense training or actual combat?"

"Actual combat, of course."

Edward simply nodded at that, and Weiss looked at him with a poorly masked expression of confusion.

Oblivious to both Weiss's confusion and Ed's tired sighs, Ruby jumped into the conversation. "Oh yeah! We are going to combat class, aren't we!" Ruby shouted. "I've been so excited to fight other people, I can't believe I forgot!"

She got a look of disbelief in response. "You mean you didn't even know where we were going?" Weiss asked incredulously. Before she could reply verbally, Weiss groaned as she assumed the worst from her team leader's sheepish grin. "And to think you offered to escort Edward to class on your own."

"Hey, I had a good reason for that!" Ruby yelled in protest, even as Weiss turned away and walked down the hall at a slightly faster pace, as if she didn't want any onlookers to associate her with the smaller girl in any way.

"And that is?" Ed asked.

Ruby flushed as she turned to Ed in shock, as if she had forgotten that the person she had just been talking about was still beside them. "Umm, hey Ed. It's alright if I can call you Ed, right?" she asked, unsure of how to start the conversation.

"Sure," he said. "Some people call me that and some don't. I don't really care either way."

"Okay," she said, giving a small nod. Looking back at Weiss, who was currently leading them down the winding halls towards the training arena, she furiously thought about how to start the conversation until, in one brilliant moment, she had an epiphany.

"So… I got this thing." and in an instant, her scythe was out in her hand and stabbed into the floor with the magnificent sound of metal scraping on solid rock. Judging by the way that Ed had jumped back with an expression of what looked like awe in his eyes, she internally congratulated herself for making such a good first impression. The fact that he had almost started clapping was a good sign too.

"What…" Ed said, slack-jawed at the new development.

"I know right?! She's my baby!" she said ecstatically as she brought the scythe in closer for a loving hug. "She's also a customizable high-impact sniper rifle!"

"What?" Ed repeated.

Ruby smiled at the familiar behaviour. Maybe it was a blonde thing. "It's also a g-"

"Ruby Rose!" A high-pitched scream pierced her ears, as she realized that her partner had turned around to face her again. "Must you insist on causing property damage whenever you pull that thing out? People walk through these halls, you know."

"Oh." Ruby suddenly saw an image of Jaune walking through the halls, his foot managing to get caught in the tiniest of cracks that her scythe had made on the ground. "Sorry," she said sheepishly as she retracted the scythe into her portable form without breaking stride.

Neither of them had noticed that Ed was frozen on the spot until he spoke up. "What the hell was that? Is that's what's considered normal here?"

"Not in a million years," the two girls said in synchrony. While Weiss was slightly surprised at their mutual agreement, Ruby was unfazed and continued on.

"My Crescent Rose is a one of a kind creation. I'm one of the few scythe users in Remnant and even then, my baby is special," she claimed proudly, but after a short afterthought she lowered her pose and removed her hands from her hips. "But of course, I'm just a normal girl."

"What I wanted to say," Weiss said, ignoring Ruby's shameless self-praise, "is that everybody has their own unique style and that no weapon could ever be considered to be 'normal.' Except maybe Jaune's."

Edward, though he managed to finally close his mouth, still had an undiluted expression of disbelief. "That's not what I," he started before sighing. "You know what, never mind."

"Aw cheer up, Ed." Ruby had somehow gotten behind him and was pushing him lightly down the hall, urging him to continue moving. "Just because you don't have a weapon of your own doesn't mean you can't make one whenever you want."

Ed looked at Ruby in surprise, but Weiss had her back turned to him again and hadn't noticed that he had opened his mouth to talk. "Of course, we understand if you're more comfortable fighting without a weapon, but I'm willing to guess that Ruby has been excited to use you as some sort of guinea pig for her mad scientist ways," she said, giving the person in question a suspicious glare as Ruby shifted to the left so Ed's body would block the line of sight between them. "None of our friends want any changes to their weapons so the fact that you don't have a weapon at all means to her that she can make one for you."

"How did you know that Weiss?" Ruby asked from behind Ed. "Did Yang tell you?"

"No you're just very easy to read."

"Well," Ed said, before Ruby could shoot back her protests. "Sorry Ruby, but I don't really like to use weapons too much. I mean, if there's a weapon lying around I'll use it, but I'm not going to be relying on any one thing." He held his hands up and turned away as she shot him puppy eyes.

"But why?" she asked, pleadingly. "Weapons are so cool! If you don't like weapons, it's just possible that you haven't seen enough to know! Even Professor Goodwitch uses a weapon, and she doesn't even use it to hit anything besides tables. Oh I know!" she said, ignoring or not noticing the slight shiver that Ed had when Glynda's name was mentioned. "Weiss! Why don't you show him Myrtenaster? It could give some ideas as to what Ed wants in his new weapon."

Ignoring Ed's claims that he didn't want a weapon at all, Weiss sighed and handed over the rapier from her belt. "Just give it a look over, it's the fastest and easiest way to get her to stop," she said, not bothering to lower her voice.

Ed sighed again and took the rapier, taking care to not accidentally cut himself. Under Ruby's watchful and expectant eye, he pretended to analyze it for a few seconds before trying to hand it back to Weiss, but when Ruby stepped in between them with her arms crossed, he sighed and took a little more time to give the weapon a more 'thorough' lookover.

It was certainly a finely crafted weapon, far better quality that the spears and sword that he occasionally created himself for temporary use, but that didn't really impress him. After fighting various opponents who could catch, destroy, or completely ignore his weapons with relative ease, he stopped seeing the point in using them. Melee weapons were only as good as their wielder's skill, and he was just against using guns in general. Nothing about this weapon seemed to mitigate any of those flaws and he was about to hand it back and repeat his findings out loud, before he froze at the strange glowing cartridges at the hilt of the weapon. They seemed somewhat familiar. He struggled to hold down the bile that threatened to rise out of his body.

"Oh you found something you like, huh?" Ruby noted from behind him as she pushed him to make sure that he kept walking as he did his analysis.

"Weiss. What is this?" Ed asked, ignoring Ruby's hopeful comment.

"Hmm?" she said, a bit distractedly. "Oh, you mean the dust cartridges?" she asked absentmindedly while she alternated between looking at her scroll for the time and down the hall, to where she finally spotted the training arenas at the far end.

"Is that what you call it here? Dust?" Ruby couldn't see Ed's expression from behind him, but for some reason she could feel him shaking slightly. "Can you tell me what this dust does?"

"I use it to produce raw energy and incorporate that into my attacks," Weiss said, more focused on the upcoming class than the actual conversation.

"Something from nothing, huh," Ed said. Ruby noted that his voice held a darker tone than she was used to.

"Mhmm, it's amazing how much energy can be packed into such small crystals isn't it?"

"But at what cost?"

This caught Weiss's attention and she stopped dead in her tracks. Gripping her fists tightly, she spun around, prepared to give Edward a lecture about the cost and necessary resources required to mine large amounts of dust, but she wasn't prepared for his solemn expression.

Her anger diffused slightly. She was prepared to enter some sort of shouting match against someone who disapproved the industry of dust mining without knowing anything, but was met with the face of a man who, despite being younger than her, seemed to have seen much suffering than she had. And he looked tired of it all.

"Look Edward," she started, a hint of uncertainty in her voice due the contrast in the emotions that she had expected from him versus the emotions that he was currently showing. "I'll be honest, even I don't agree with some of the practices that my father's company follows, but I know that it's a necessary evil that someone has to pay in order for the world to have reliable access to dust."

"Does that excuse the innocent lives that are wasted away, just to power your little toys?" he asked. A question like that should have been loaded with hidden anger, but he simply seemed disappointed.

"No!" Weiss almost yelled in horror. It took a few seconds before she calmed back down. "You may not realize this or you may take it for granted, but more than ninety percent of our dust goes to powering entire cities. And it's not like dust is unnecessary for us to do our jobs as Hunters."

Ed's wide-eyed expression told her that he did not, in fact, know that most of his everyday life was powered by dust. But despite the urge to berate him for his ignorance, she felt a strange sort of maturity from him that made it hard for her assume that she was smarter than him. Ruby's mirrored expression on the other hand, was inexcusable and she would deal with that later.

"Almost everything in our daily lives is powered by dust. Yes, it is true that our employees often find themselves on the rotten end of the stick, but I promise that they and their families are compensated properly."

"And that makes it okay?" Edward was visibly shaking now, and Ruby had finally noticed that something was wrong. "You think that a big wad of money will make their family forget about them and make everything better? You think that a bunch of coins will appease the fact that they'll never see each other again?"

"Huh?"

Ed looked up in confusion at the unexpected reply to see equally confused expressions on the faces of both Ruby and Weiss.

"Huh?" was his own reply.

"Do you not assume we give them vacation days or something?" Weiss asked incredulously. "No matter how racist everyone seems to think we are, the Schnee Dust Company isn't run by monsters. It's not like we think of our employees as livestock or slaves. We give them standard living conditions on site and paid vacation days. There is a lot of risk that goes with dust mining and they do have to stay on site for months at a time, but we have to ensure that the entirety of Remnant gets a steady flow of dust," she said in exasperation.

"Mining?"

"Yes, mining!" Weiss said. Her unexplainable feelings of respect for the boy were slowly waning and her self justifications for talking to him politely were slowly wearing off. "How do you think we get dust!? The big bad evil Schnee man grabs a bunch of Faunus off the streets, puts them in a blender, and we freeze the juice to get dust crystals?!"

The look of genuine relief on his face did nothing but make her angrier.

"Forget this!" she said, throwing her hands up in frustration.

As she stalked off, Ed gave a weak grin in her direction. From what he could gather from that wreck of a conversation was that Weiss was tightly related to the main producer of dust, quite possibly being a daughter of the company's boss, and he had just pissed her off by assuming that dust was of the same nature as a philosopher's stone. While he regretted his words and internally grimaced at the idea of having to resolve that issue, he was eternally grateful that he hadn't been sent to another sick universe where people could casually use the lives of others to literally fuel their weapons of war.

He looked at the weapon in his hand that Weiss had seemingly forgotten to retrieve in her frustration. He no longer felt sickened by its touch, but the feeling that emanated from the colourful cartridges was still eerily familiar.

To his side, he noticed movement and when he looked around, he was reminded of the second girl who had been accompanying him to class who now held an expression that looked like a cross between being upset and suspicious.

"Look, I'm really sorry that I made Weiss snap like that," he said. "I've never seen dust before and I had some sort of misunderstanding about what it was. It felt very familiar to something I had seen before and I didn't have very good memories associated with that."

"You've never seen dust before." Ruby crossed her arms and stared intensely at him.

"No."

Surprisingly she sighed and shook her head. "Even though that's pretty unbelievable, I still believe you," she said. "If you're still think coins even exist, that probably means you didn't live in Vale or near any sort of civilization, really. You should still apologize to her, but I'll help you explain to her if you really need it."

Ed nodded at her suggestion and walked down the hallway to the door that Weiss was waiting in front of.

"I wasn't waiting for you," she said viciously before he even asked. "You have my weapon and you're the reason I'm late for class." She offered no further explanation and simply held out her hand.

"Weiss," Ed started. His only response was a harsh glare, but he ignored it. "Before all this gets out of hand I want to say sorry." He gave a low bow and held the sword out in front of him.

"I've never seen dust in my life. The only thing I had to compare it to was an energy source that could only be obtained by the sacrificing the lives of other people. The people with power only wanted more, abused that energy maliciously and used their citizens as fuel for their power." Edward grimaced as he remembered that he had once wanted the same thing. "I'm sorry that I seem to have insulted you and I'm sorry that I jumped to conclusions."

After a few seconds of not hearing any movement or feeling the rapier leave his grasp, he looked back up to see that Weiss had a look of absolute shock on her face.

"Well, I've explained myself so it's up to you to decide whether you hate me or not," he said as he gently placed the rapier back into her still outstretched hand. The physical contact seemed to shock Weiss back into reality, but she still regarded him with a look of disbelief.

He promptly walked past her and entered the training arena.

He was met with a surprisingly loud series of clangs which he immediately recognized as the sound of metal clashing against metal. While the raised stage prevented him from seeing anything properly, he looked around to see a familiar group of people sitting on spectator stands relatively close to him, some of whom had already noticed him and were waving him towards their direction.

As he walked up, he noticed a giant display of light on the wall across from him that was pretty similar to the scroll he carried in his pocket, except it was a thousand times bigger. Trying not to be impressed by the incredible technology of the world again, he looked around the large room to see that several groups of teenagers littered the spectator stands of the decently sized stadium including his own "team." The tall blonde guy, Jaune, waved him down and motioned to the free seat beside him. Ed graciously nodded and sat down, finally getting a good look of the stadium below.

It wasn't a very long distance down, but he still had to squint a bit to make out the features of the three people below. He instantly recognized one of them as the terrifying Professor Goodwitch, but the other two were unfamiliar. One of them was a slim boy with a ridiculous light green mohawk on his head and one knee on the ground. Even from this distance, Ed could easily tell he was panting. The other had a neat military haircut. He held a bo staff in his hand, but for some reason he was pointing it at the other boy as if it was a javelin. While he was still standing, his shaky posture also gave away his poor condition.

"The match is over. The winner is Bruno Baum," Professor Goodwitch said in an impossibly loud voice that seemed to emanate from around the stadium, as the military boy planted his staff into the ground, momentarily catching his breath before standing up straight and offering a hand to the mohawked boy. The mohawked boy accepted his hand and gave him a short nod.

"Mr. Thrush," Professor Goodwitch said, turning to the mohawked boy. "While your initial assault was almost enough to win the match on its own, you failed to press the attack and your opponent was able to regain his guard and retaliate against you with relative ease. See to it that you work on your ability to get past your opponent's defenses." The boy's grimace told her that even though he agreed with her statements, he didn't like it.

"Mr. Baum. While your defense was impressive once you had regained your footing, you were caught off guard in the beginning. While that can be explained by having to participating in the first match of the class, your recovery was much too slow." She took a brief second to redirect the entire classes attention to the screen above her. "While you managed to take minimal damage during Mr. Thrush's following attacks, the first attack alone was enough to decrease your aura by more than fifty percent."

Ed's eyes followed everyone else's to the screen to see that both Thrush's and Baum's faces were on display. Underneath those pictures were two bars. The one under Thrush's was almost empty and was red, while the one under Baum's was slightly more filled and was orange instead.

"Hey Ed," a voice said from behind him. "Weren't Ruby and Weiss with you?"

Turning around he met the purple eyes of who he remembered to be Yang. He noted to himself that she hadn't asked him if she could call him Ed like Ruby had.

"Yeah," he said, but before he could continue, he noticed that Yang attention had briefly been redirected towards the door. Following her gaze, Ed saw the figures of Weiss and Ruby quietly entering the room. "There they are."

"Mhmm," Yang grunted, apparently appeased with his answer. She waved them down until they spotted her before she turned back to him.

"Weiss looks a bit upset," she said, bluntly. "What, did you already get into a fight with the Ice Queen?"

"Nah, just a little misunderstanding."

Ed wondered if Yang was going to ask him pry any further, but Glynda's voice boomed out from around the stadium again. "Next fighters, Lie Ren and Aurelia Lamna."

As the green-clad boy stood up from a few seats away, Ed stood up pre-emptively in order to let him pass, but the rest of his teammates didn't bother as Ren had decided to jump down from the stands instead, saving him the short walk. A few of them looked up at Ed who in return, gave them a sheepish smile.

Before he sat back down, he felt a hand on his shoulder and turned around to see Weiss staring him dead in the eye. A moment passed before anything was said, but Weiss soon spoke up. "I accept your apology, and I'm also sorry for my own rash behaviour."

And with that she gently pushed past him towards the seat beside Blake. Ruby gave Ed a slight shrug as she passed by.

"I think she likes you," Yang said. She either ignored or didn't notice the glare that the girl in question shot at her.

Ed gave a slight grin at the both of them and turned back towards the stage, a blonde girl with long hair tied in a ponytail had finished climbing up the stairs to the arena, not having taken the same shortcut that Ren had. "Because it's the first day, I'd like to remind everyone that the match ends whenever one combatant has dropped into the red, or lower than fifteen percent. These rules will apply to all the matches that take place in this room and also to all friendly matches between Hunters and Hunters-in-training. Do you both understand?" Glynda looked at both of the students currently in the ring with her until they both nodded. "Very well then," she said, stepping back. "You may begin."

Ed was impressed at how Ren had quite literally, burst into action, starting his assault by running at his opponent while firing several rounds of bullet at her. She reacted by quickly thrusting out a thin fabric-like material and shielding herself with it. It didn't matter if Ren was shooting rubber bullets, he didn't expect such a fragile looking material to hold up. Unfortunately for her, Ren didn't fire the bullets to harm, but rather to distract. The entire class discovered this when Ren lowered his body to kick her legs out from underneath. Though she hit the ground hard, she was able to recover before Ren kicked down onto where her head had once been. As she rolled away, she snapped her wrist outward and her "weapon" extended towards him, threatening to grab at Ren's ankles. Fortunately, he saw this coming and backed away before it could reach him.

A small moment passed where the two combatants took some time to size each other up, and they rushed each other once again.

Even as Ed noted the distinct similarities between the way that Ren and the Xingese fought, something else caught his attention. On the screen that now had Ren's and Aurelia's faces replacing those of the previous combatants, the bar underneath Ren's face was now completely full and green, while Aurelia's bar was slightly lower and had a faint yellowish green tinge. After a moment, he noticed that Ren's bar lowered by a significant amount accompanied by the loud crack of what sounded like a whip. Looking down, he saw that Ren was clutching his arm with a slight expression of pain. It only lasted a moment as Ren dashed in again, employing the same tactic that he started out with and Aurelia responded in kind. Ed was surprised to see that instead of going for the same leg sweep that had worked before, he threw his guns in the air. Somehow they were still firing at the shielded girl while Ren himself dashed behind her. Blinded by her own defense, she never noticed him until his foot was planted firmly into the back of her neck.

"Hey Yang?" Ed asked, going back to his previous conversation partner.

"What's up?" she asked, though she didn't peel her eyes away from the fight.

"What exactly does it mean by 'dropping into the red?'" he asked. He was sure that once the bars underneath the portraits were somehow linked to the damage the fighters accumulated, but he wasn't exactly sure about how it worked.

"It's when your aura drops below fifteen percent. Of course you could technically still keep fighting even without aura, but after a certain point it becomes too dangerous to do that and any hits you take might actually translate into real damage." She still kept her eyes locked onto the battle, wincing a bit as Ren used his foot stomp the girl into the floor.

"And what's aura?"

That was enough to force Yang's attention away from the fight. "You're kidding, right?" she asked, searching his face for anything other than genuine confusion. "You know, manifestation of our soul. Shields us, heals us… protects us from stray bullets?"

Ed watched as she paled and made a small, uncharacteristic gasp. Blake had taken notice and quickly glanced over, but was still mostly focused on the fight.

"Jaune," Yang suddenly said, slapping the other blonde's shoulder. "Jaune. Get up now and stand in front of Ed."

"Yang?" Jaune asked, not expecting her to disturb him from his spectator experience.

"Just listen to me. Pull out your shield and stand in front of Ed." Yang stared at him with an urgency and intensity that he didn't expect and couldn't help but obey.

"Jaune?" Pyrrha asked, noticing her partner fumbling with his shield and taking his position in front of the equally confused Edward. "Yang? What's going on?"

By now, the rest of team RWBY had realised that something had gone wrong and their interest was also being pulled away. Nora seemed more interested in cheering on her best friend.

"Now Ed, listen to me. I need you to close your eyes and concentrate," she said as she took his head in her hands.

"Umm, Yang? What's going on?" Ruby asked, giving voice to the question that everybody had in their minds.

"For it is in passing that we achieve immortality." Ruby gasped as she heard the familiar line. She wasn't the only one. "Through this, we become a flame of passion and ambition to overcome all trials, a spirit of freedom, chained down by noone. I release your soul, and by my fist welcome thee." Yang let go and started to gasp for air, as if someone had given her a solid punch to the gut. After a few moments where the only noise came from the center of the arena and Yang's tired panting, she managed to regain her strength and assumed a proper sitting position.

She then proceeded to hit Ed on the back of his head, but only managed to muster enough strength to give him a dull slap.

"What the he-"

"Yang Xiao Long!" A shrill voice interrupted him with a controlled volume that was just quiet enough for their surrounding classmates and teacher couldn't hear. "What in the world was that all about?!"

She gave her a grim smile. "He didn't have his aura unlocked. I had to unlock it in case one of Ren's bullet accidentally came this way and-" Yang cocked a finger gun towards her head. "Pow."

"What?!" Weiss screamed without her previous volume control, joined by a few other members of Team RWBY. Jaune and Pyrrha looked equally surprised, but only shared a quick glance at each other.

"And the winner of the match is Lie Ren," a loud voice said, uninterested in whatever epiphany team RWBY had stumbled upon. Looking back down, they saw the green clad gunman looking back up at them, pleased that his finishing move had drawn such a surprised response.

"Mr. Lie, you have an expert control over your body and a very good grasp of the battlefield, but unfortunately you hits lack power. You had no trouble getting past Ms. Lamna's guard and getting hits in but quite frankly, with the strength of your hits, Ms. Lamna could have easily ignored her own defense and focused all of her attention into offense. Ms. Lamna, you have a very abusable habit of covering yourself with your weapon whenever you go into a defensive position. While it is quite effective against blocking projectiles, it blinds you and leaves you open for attack." Aurelia looked over at Ren and nodded, thankful at how he had made her bad habits painfully obvious.

"Now," Glynda said as she tapped the screen of the scroll. "All fighters off the stage. Will Yang Xiao Long and Pyrrha Nikos join us on stage?"

All of RWBY, JNPR, and Ed gave a quick glance at Yang who obviously didn't look like she was in any condition to fight. Even as her face came up on the screen, replacing Ren's, the bar barely filled up halfway.

Glynda frowned as she saw this and crossed her arms expectantly towards the two teams. Pyrrha wordlessly jumped down onto the stage and walked over to the Professor. With a few hushed words, Glynda raised an eyebrow and leant over slightly so Pyrrha could whisper into her ear. After a few seconds, her eyes widened to a point where everyone could notice, despite being seated in the stands.

"This match is cancelled, we will be moving on to the next match," Glynda said glossing over the strange event. She gave a few words to Pyrrha in a hushed voice which led her to nod, and jump back towards where her team was sitting. "Next fighters, Cardin Winchester and Albus Solis."

"We should go," Pyrrha said as she landed gracefully onto the seat directly in front of her team leader. "Professor Goodwitch instructed us to head to Professor Ozpin's office immediately."

* * *

The walk was silent. Nobody said anything, simply because nobody fully understood the situation. Even after having his aura unlocked, he didn't fully understand what it was. Of course, from what Yang had said, he had pieced together that this "Aura" was some kind of energy that the fighters in this world possessed that could protect them from harm, and from the way that she instructed Jaune to stand between him and the arena, he imagined that Ren had been using live ammunition for the entire fight.

Yang was too tired to properly think about the strange situation, but with the little energy that she possessed, she wondered about how Ozpin could accept someone without an aura into a combat school. It was absurd. Sure, you could fight well enough with or without it, but what if they had never discovered that he didn't have an aura until it was too late? Many of their teammates seemed to hold the same thoughts.

Ruby and Weiss were even more confused. They had both come to the conclusion that Ed had been raised outside the kingdoms, possibly under the apprenticeship of an experienced Hunter, one that would be old enough to be Ozpin's good friend. Even if that wasn't the case, it didn't make sense that someone who lived in such a Grimm-infested area could survive without an Aura.

Jaune had mixed feelings. While he was terrified at the idea that Ed could have easily died that day, he was a bit glad to have a kindred spirit.

Ren and Nora had no idea why they were heading to the Headmaster's office in the first place. Nobody had spoken a word since they left the training arenas in a hurry, and no explanations were given. Despite this, both of them could tell that something was wrong.

The elevator was a bit crowded with nine bodies, but they all stepped in. When they exited, Ruby and Jaune led the way, having been the only ones who went to Ozpin's office before.

Ruby reached for the door handle, but once she had effectively identified which door led to Ozpin's office, Yang nudged past her and pushed the door open with a bit more force than necessary. She found Ozpin sitting at his desk with a hard look on his face.

"Ed could have died today," Yang said, walking intently towards him despite Ruby's soft protests. "Professor, how could you let someone into Beacon when you know they don't even have an Aura?" Nobody but Pyrrha seemed to notice Jaune wince a bit at that comment.

Ozpin looked directly into Yang's eyes, neither of them refusing to back down. He sighed even as she continued to stare down at him, and addressed the group behind her. "Everybody please come in. I would like if you sat down too, but I do understand if you're not in the mood for that." He gestured to the chairs situated near the wall, but made no further motions when none of the teens reached out for one.

"Now I'm sure you all have a large number of questions for both me and our newest friend here," he said, gesturing to Edward, "but before I start, I'm afraid that there are some things I cannot tell you." He held a hand out before Yang started to speak again. "But I will try my best."

"Okay," Yang said. "First of all, why doesn't he have an Aura?"

"To be quite frank, even I was not aware that he didn't have an Aura. Our medical staff simply assumed it was Aura depletion and I took their word for it," Ozpin said, looking intently at the boy in question. "Perhaps, Mr. Elric, you could give us some insight?"

"Am I allowed to answer that, Professor Ozpin?" Ed asked in a slightly sarcastic tone.

"As long as you do not break any of our previous agreements, Mr. Elric. Although I do suppose we will have to make some amendments to those rules soon," he added in a tired voice.

Ed nodded and looked around at his new friends. Well, that friendship was in danger of being broken before it even started, all due to a couple of secrets. He was getting pretty tired of secrets in general.

"I come from a place where nobody has ever heard of Aura, dust, or scrolls." He disregarded the surprised looks on everyone's faces and continued.

"Where exactly is that?" Blake spoke up. "I've… read a bit on living outside the kingdoms, but even the most far away places have dust. In fact, most of the Grimmlands just have random dust veins scattered through the land."

"I can't say." Ed jerked a thumb towards Ozpin as he said this.

"He comes from an unnamed island in the middle of the Eastern Sea. He was trained under an old friend of mine who was very traditional in his training and didn't use any means of dust. While he did use Aura, he expected Mr. Elric to unlock it on his own, never even naming the mysterious power that would let him take life-threatening hits without dying. None of that is true." Ozpin looked at the group. While there were eight students, each of them felt like he was staring them dead in the eyes. "But that is what his story is and that is what I expect you to believe."

It took a moment for all of them to understand what Ozpin meant, but Pyrrha was the first to recover and ask another question. "Why come to Beacon?"

"I entered Beacon because Professor Ozpin offered me a place where I could study about the world, and I didn't think anything of it. I never thought that Beacon could be a training school for the military, but to be honest I'm used to it."

"Actually, Mr. Elric," Ozpin spoke up before any of the other students could interject. "This school is not associated with the military in any way."

Ed raised an eyebrow. "And I'm supposed to expect that when your students train with live ammo?"

"Yes." Ed didn't expect Ozpin's frank answer, but didn't interrupt. "At Beacon we train students to fight against our natural enemy, the Grimm. I trust you remember those?"

"Wait, wait a second," Yang said, waving her arms. "If you didn't even know this was a combat school, then why are you here?"

Ed shrugged. "To study."

Yang briefly clutched her forehead. "Why did you offer him a spot here then? Why did you let him wander into a danger that he didn't know about?" she asked Ozpin, redirecting her questions to someone that she hoped would give better answers.

Ozpin stood up without a word, and walked around his desk towards the students. If they hadn't realized how tall he was before, he made it quite obvious then.

"Everyone in team RWBY and team JNPR," he said with an intense look in his eyes. "None of this is to leave this room. You will not repeat anything that you learn here to your friends, family, or even any of the staff here at Beacon with the exception of Professor Goodwitch." It was not a request, it was not an order. It felt like Ozpin was stating a series of facts, as if the alternative to his words were an impossibility.

He didn't bother waiting for any sort of agreement or comments from the students before he turned to Edward. "Mr. Elric. Could you please demonstrate your abilities to us?"

"I thought you made me agree not to use my alchemy at all," he stated matter-of-factly. He couldn't help but notice that Ozpin raised an eyebrow when gave name to his technique for the first time.

"Yes, and I was wrong to do so. While I still want you to refrain from standing out, your team is your family and you should never keep any secrets from if you can help it." He easily ignored the slight twitches that came from Blake and Jaune. "I was foolish to try and make you hide things from your team."

Ed only shrugged. "Alright then, I didn't really care either way," he said as he clapped his hands together.

He reached out for the coffee mug that Ozpin held in his hands and a bright spark of blue appeared, but nothing happened. The rest of the teens in the room held their breaths in anticipation, but when nothing happened most of them let go preemptively.

"Weird, that's never happened before," Ed muttered. "Professor Ozpin, could I see that mug a bit more closely?"

Ozpin handed him the mug, albeit a bit reluctantly.

"Alright, here goes nothing," he said as he clapped his hands together again. Touching the mug once again, the familiar blue sparks emerged from his hands once again and in a flash of light, the mug was gone. In it's place stood a strange demonic statue made of ceramic. "Huh, looks like it worked that time."

Turning around, he looked around at his peers and looked at him slack-jawed. Or rather, they were looking at the small object in his hands.

"What. Was that?" Jaune asked, breaking the short silence. For once, the rest of his friends agreed with his ignorance.

"That's such a cool semblance," Nora said.

"No, Ms. Valkyrie," Ozpin stated. "He had this ability before were we even aware that he had an aura. It is not a semblance, or at least it is not a semblance in the conventional sense."

"Then, what is it?" Jaune asked.

Ozpin gave what looked like a cross between a genuine smile and a grimace. "I'm sorry to deny you this, but that is where we stop today, Mr. Arc. I hope I will be able to tell you one day." It was a strange sight to see that Edward was just as confused as the rest of them, ignorant of what his own power meant to Ozpin and the rest of Remnant.

* * *

As he sent the students on their way, he looked at the cup that Edward had graciously restored from its previous state as a tacky figurine.

After examining the cup for any indication of anything, the only thing he could find was a small series of square marks, barely visible to the naked eye.

He put it down, satisfied with his search but dissatisfied with the results.

It seemed that Ed couldn't just control the elements. He could control all matter and bend it to his will.

He didn't know what this alchemy was, but if this was what magic could do, he was terrified at the thoughts of what their enemies could do if they got their hands on it.

* * *

 **So there's a bit to say about this chapter. First of all, I want to reiterate that there will be no pairings between Ed and any of the RWBY characters. Secondly, when I had Yang unlock his aura, I used a slightly different aura unlocking chant that followed the basic structure of Pyrrha's but was altered to suit Yang a bit more. I've seen a few fics do this and it's just a small detail that I prefer to the alternative of everybody having the same chant.**

 **So when will Ed finally learn enough about the world to not be seen as an ignorant? Who knows? Personally I hope that I'll be done with the whole 'Edward doesn't know about the world and figures it out through a series of clumsy misunderstandings and conversations' thing soon. I somewhat enjoy it, but it's a bit tiring to mention that everybody has their eyebrows raised and a confused look on their face every other line. Once I get this exposition stuff out of the way and get to writing actual story arcs, I hope it'll be much smoother and even more fun to write.**

 **Might go back and edit this later, who knows. Probably not any time soon, but I'll make sure to mention if I do.**

 **Fun thought I had while writing this chapter.**

 **Ed's entire personality is kind of like a mishmash of the personalities on team RWBY**

 **Yang is blunt to the point of rudeness and is also short-tempered.**

 **Blake is cynical to the world and has no problem with breaking the rules.**

 **Weiss is prideful and always willing to start an argument.**

 **Ruby is...**

 **Ruby is...**

 **Short...**

 **She also likes red.**

 **...**

 **Yeah.**


	6. Chapter 6

**Alright, so quick explanation on why I took so long to update this chapter. Long story short, my writing style isn't really suited to writing while also attending school. I find that I can sit down and write for an obscene amount of time without any problems, but on the flipside I need an obscene amount of time to write anything substantial.**

 **A few times over the past month or so, I've sat down for an hour and tried to write, but I never write more than a few hundred words. When I write for longer than an hour, my writing progress increases exponentially, but during school times, I've never had the opportunity to sit down and just think about nothing other than writing for hours on end. Chapters one through five were all done in one or two sittings each but I could afford to do that during the summer. Work doesn't require you to think about work when you're not at work. School is all consuming.**

 **I am NOT quitting writing this story, but please understand and please forgive me if updates take a lot longer than you would like. Quite frankly, I'm shocked at the amount of views, follows, favourites, and reviews this story is getting and it's really flattering that a bunch of you like it. I love writing this story and I don't think I'll stop until I reach the ending that I want.**

 **Believe me when I say that I am infinitely more frustrated than any of you when it comes to my slow progress. I have so many cool upcoming ideas, but I simply can't write about because I'm not there yet.**

 **So TLDR. Updates have been slow and will probably be slow as the year continues. I'm NOT stopping or taking a break from writing.**

 **Stay in school kids. Defeat the beast. Eat it and gain its powers.**

* * *

"Remnant."

"That's just the name of this world."

"Vale."

"That's the country we're in."

"Nope. Well you're half right, actually. We're in Vale, but nobody really refers to it as a country. It's officially a kingdom."

"The nearby city's also called Vale, so try not to mix them up," a new voice offered.

"Doesn't that get confusing?"

"Nah, you'll get used to it. Patch," the new voice said, continuing the pattern of questions and answers.

"Assuming you're talking about a place, never heard of it."

"Actually, I don't really know much about Patch either," someone said from behind them. Ed, Ruby, and Yang turned around to see Jaune giving them an awkward grin.

"Oh," Ruby said, "Well to be honest, Patch isn't a place that everybody knows anyways. The only special thing about the island is Signal Academy. Otherwise, it's just a boring old island off the coast of Vale."

"You mean the city or the kingdom?" Ed asked.

"Both."

"Alright," he replied, nodding absentmindedly. "And Signal is the combat academy that you and Yang went to, right?"

"Yup," she replied. She gazed off into the distance as she racked her brain for topics to question Ed on. "So how much do you know about Aura?"

He grimaced, remembering the rushed panic that he felt when he learned that a stray bullet could have been the death of him, only an hour before. "Not enough," he said.

"Well at least you have it now, right?" Yang interrupted, rejoining the impromptu quiz session. "Knowing the technical stuff might just confuse you and at worst, it'll give you weird ideas about the stuff. It's better to feel it out on your own before trying to get into the deeper stuff."

Ignoring the frantic scratching of the pen that started behind him, Ed nodded. "Alright, I'll be patient. Actually there was something I wanted to ask about. You guy's mentioned it briefly, but what's a Semblance?"

"Did we mention that?" Yang asked absentmindedly. "Well, the textbook definition is something like 'a manifestation of your soul,' but I like to think of it as a unique superpower that every hunter has. It can be something like powering yourself up or controlling electricity, but I think giving examples are pretty pointless. When I say that semblances are unique, I really mean that they're unique."

"Wait, I have a question about that." Yang, Ed, and Ruby all turned around to see Jaune looking at them sheepishly, his notebook in one hand and a hand shyly raised up. "Doesn't Ed have a Semblance? I mean I know Ozpin said it wasn't a Semblance, but why not?"

She shrugged. "Hell if I know."

"Actually guys," Ed interrupted. "There were a few more things I wanted to ask about. There were a few words that you guys mentioned once or twice that I wasn't familiar with."

"Well, go ahead. I'll do the best I can," Yang replied, yawning and leaning over on the desk in front of her.

Ed nodded. "First of all, what exactly is Dust?"

"It explodes pretty nice." A few moments of silence passed before the listeners realized that she had finished her explanation.

"Umm. Yang?" Ruby spoke up. "I think we were all expecting a better explanation than that."

She shifted in her shoulders in a way that suggested that she was trying to shrug but wasn't willing give up her comfortable position on the desk. "I said I'd try my best. Why don't you ask Weiss? She knows way more than I do. About Dust."

Ruby made to reach over Yang's unmoving body and tap Weiss on the shoulder, but she hesitated. She thought back on the recent argument that Ed and Weiss had about the very same topic. Sure it only started because of a misunderstanding, but maybe it was still a touchy subject, even if they did kind of make up. If Weiss was still sore about the event, she didn't want to be the one to remind her about it.

Looking over at her, she analyzed her partner for any signs of what she should expect in the case that she did ask her about Dust for Ed's sake. Her first thought was that it was quite amazing that Weiss hadn't already heard Yang make the suggestion to ask her for help. Even if they were sitting right next to each other, Weiss was sitting upright in her chair with her eyes closed, face forwards, and fists clenched. Ruby became even more hesitant after seeing Weiss's intense concentration, but she noticed that Jaune's hand, peeking in from the edges of her peripheral vision, was reaching over to get her attention.

"Hey, Weiss," she said, quickly leaning over Yang's limp body to tap her partner's shoulder. No matter how annoyed she would be with her, Ruby had no doubt that having Jaune waking her up from her session of what seemed to be meditation would only put her in a worse mood. "Could you help us explain Dust to Ed? We're just making sure that he knows about the basic things about life that he couldn't learn out in his hometown."

Weiss remained unmoving, though Jaune's hand slowly backed out of Ruby's field of view.

"Weiss? Did you hear me?" Ruby shook her partner a bit. Looking down at her fists, she noticed that her already pale knuckles were whiter than usual. She frowned. Was Weiss sick? Normally, colour drained from your face when you don't feel well, but Weiss was rich so maybe it worked differently.

"Weiss? Are you okay? Do you need me to take you to the infirmary?" Ruby asked with a frown, her voice coated with genuine concern.

Weiss let out a slow breath between clenched teeth. "Why are you talking to me, Ruby," she said in a tone of voice that implied that she was giving a statement, rather than asking a question.

"Well, me and Yang were trying to see what other basic knowledge Ed didn't know about already. I think Jaune and Nora were involved at some point but Nora bailed pretty quickly when we started asking him about whether he knew math. We got pretty bored with that soon, so we let him ask questions instead of us quizzing him and he asked about how Dust works. Now I know you two just had an argument about this, but you're the best Dust user I know, so I thought asking you was the best idea."

"Ruby, thank you for the compliment," she started, eyes still shut closed and fists still clenched tight. "But this might not be the best time for playing games."

"What, do you mean Weiss?"

"I mean that this is completely inappropriate behaviour for a classroom setting!" she using a louder voice than she had originally intended.

"Miss Schnee!" A loud voice rang from the centre of the room, shocking Weiss into silence. Thankfully for her, barely anyone was awake enough to have noticed her little outburst or the teacher's scolding reply. "While it is completely understandable for you to want to prove yourself as a Huntress, you must learn patience. You've already faced a Boarbatusk yesterday. Now it's my tu-"

The moustached man in the centre of the classroom gave a small grunt as the large Ursa swiped at his face, the unexpected display of agility catching him off guard as the Grimm managed to land a blow despite being held in a chokehold. "Oh, you're a feisty one aren't you," Port said as he shrugged off the blow that would have been fatal to most other people. "Let's see if you can withstand the same technique that I used to level a mountain in my twenties. Hah!"

Weiss, her face frozen in a confused expression simply sat down as the teacher seemed to shift his focus away from reprimanding her and onto his attempts to clothesline the Ursa.

"Um, Weiss?" Ruby asked, wondering if her partner had broken down so early in the year.

Thankfully Ed didn't seem to mind that the Dust expert was unavailable to answer his questions. He seemed to be more focused on the man who was wrestling with the giant creature in the center of the classroom. Though he badly wanted to take his eyes away from the gradually increasing levels of shirtlessness, he was intrigued at how a man could wrestle a personification of death and make it look boring.

"It's fine, Ruby. I can always ask later," Ed said, wondering if making people feel bored was Professor Port's Semblance. "Why don't you help me with some of the other stuff I was wondering about?"

"Oh alright, sure!" she said, not bothering to lower her voice despite being in class. "What do you want to know?"

"Could you give me a bit more information on Aura?" he asked. "I know that Yang just said to feel it out but frankly, the only thing I know about it is that it protects me and I'm sure it's more than just that. I don't think learning a little bit would be a bad thing," He didn't bother mentioning that it might be his ticket to go back to his world and restore his little brother's body.

"Oh that? Umm, let me think," she said, putting a hand under her chin and adopting a thinker's pose. "It's more than just a tool or a weapon that we use to fight. Sure we use it to manipulate dust, or power our semblances, or to protect our bodies,"

"Kind of like a force field," Jaune chimed in from behind them, grinning at the fact that he could be useful.

"But it's much more than that. Everyone has an aura, except for the Grimm. Most people don't even know about Aura, but that just means that they don't have it unlocked. Aura is important because it's what sets us aside from the monsters. Aura is a manifestation of our souls."

Ed raised an eyebrow at that statement. "If you're using your own soul as a weapon or a shield, doesn't it ever get damaged? If you're using it as a fuel for your Semblances, aren't you slowly killing yourself by wasting it away?" Ed was uncomfortably familiar with using his own soul as fuel for his own survival, but he wondered if he would have to go through it again.

"Oh no, of course not," Ruby said, eliciting a relieved sigh from behind them. "In most cases, any used Aura regenerates over time."

"Does it really?" Ed exclaimed, a bit louder than he had meant to. Fortunately, nobody else in the room was paying attention. When Ruby nodded in reply, the implications of a regenerating life force left Ed's mind running wild. In essence, had he become an unlimited philosopher's stone?

"Hey Jaune, do you mind ripping out a sheet of paper for me?" Ed turned around, barely able to hold back his excitement as he held out his hand expectantly. "I need to test something out." If his hunch proved to be correct, he hoped that it would bring him a step closer to discovering what the Truth wanted, whatever it was. If not, well, he was still willing to potentially give up a few months or even years of his life to test out the theory.

Jaune ripped out a page from his mostly empty notebook, wondering if his fellow blond would be the first student of the year to take notes in Professor Port's class, and handed it over. "Do you want a pen too, Ed?"

Ed shook his head. "Not planning on writing on it," he said as he laid the piece of paper out onto the table. Placing one hand onto his chest and one hand onto the paper, he took a deep breath and focused on doing what he did best.

His alchemical powers seemed to lick hungrily at his chest, slowly sampling the soul that was presented to it. A little feeling of nausea welled up from within him as he relived the familiar feeling of using a living soul as a battery, but he quickly forced it down. He was using his own soul, anything that happened now hurt nobody from himself. He would be the one to pay the price.

But was that really the case? With his eyes still closed, he could clearly envision his right hand absorbing the energy from his body and crackling with a power that was waiting to be unleashed. Yet he couldn't feel a thing.

It was a terrible feeling to have your life drained out of you. Everybody always said that the soul wasn't a physical object, but the one time when he had used his own life force in an impromptu medical procedure that would ironically save his life he felt that as a piece of his soul left his body, it brought a bit of warmth with it, leaving only coldness to fill the void. He didn't feel that now. Rather than slowly killing himself to fuel his alchemy, it simply felt like he was just straining an unknown muscle to give his powers an extra push.

Without any more hesitation, he transferred his power into the piece of paper and in a flash of blue energy, a small potted bonsai took its place.

"Oh my god, that's such a cute tiny tree," Ruby said with a small squeal of joy.

"Take it," Ed said, pushing it towards her. "I don't particularly like this sort of stuff, I was really just testing a little theory of mine."

"Aww, thanks Ed," she said, pulling it closer towards her. "I think it would fit nicely with my team's room. We barely have anything in there anyways."

Jaune raised a finger as if to say something, but quickly decided against it as he decided that he shouldn't judge Ruby on what she thought was cute. Well, there was also the possibility that she didn't notice, but he was sure that she just liked the demonic looking design on the pot. His mother always told him that he should keep an open mind, even if it did make him uncomfortable.

"Did you just say your team's room?" Ed asked. "Does that mean all four of you are roommates? Does everybody share a room with the rest of their team?"

"Yup, yup, and yup," Ruby said cheerily, as she scrutinized her newest roommate's leaves.

"So what does that mean for me? Do I get a four person room to myself?"

Ruby's eyes shot open at the realization. "Which room did Ozpin say you were staying at again?"

"He said he sent me a message, but I haven't checked it yet," he said, reaching into his pocket, "Not used to this damn scroll thing yet." After a short moment with Ruby staring at him with anticipation, he finally managed to navigate through the scroll and access his messages. "It says here that I'm in 409."

Ruby gave him a wide smile to which he backed away from. "You're going to be living in a room that was meant for a four person team. There's enough space for four beds, four desks, and whatever luggage you brought. You on the other hand, need one bed, one desk, and you didn't bring any luggage with you, which leaves a lot of space for say… video equipment, board games, maybe even a little fridge?"

"What's a video syst-"

"Which leaves me, as your team leader," she exclaimed, cutting him off. "To officially declare your room as the RWBY, JNPR, and E's designated party room!"

"Wha-"

"Hey, Ruby!" Jaune spoke up, cutting him off again. "As the team leader of JNPR, I think I should have a say in this too." When Ruby pretended to hold an invisible mic to his mouth, he coughed a bit to clear his throat. "And I fully agree!"

Ed watched the two with a slacked jaw as the two of them high-fived.

"Don't I get a s-"

"AAAH!" A loud shriek of absolute terror cut him off for a third time. It also seemed to be loud enough to shock some of the other students awake, resulting in a small domino effect of startled yelps. Looking over at the source of the original scream, Ed saw that Yang was clinging to Weiss with a fearful look on her face. Weiss didn't seem to mind as the shock of being called out by a teacher was still lingering, and Blake seemed to find the situation amusing.

Following Yang's gaze, it was obvious that she was staring at the bonsai tree that was now sitting in front of Ruby. "Ah, I see one of you was intimidated by my technique," a booming voice said from the center of the room, oblivious to the fact that the feelings of intimidation were directed completely away from him. "Do not fear, the only beings that will feel the wrath of that punch are the evil creatures of Grimm! Ahahah!"

As he threw his head back with a hearty laugh, a majority of the students groaned in reply and started to pick themselves off of the floor.

* * *

"Ruby, would you mind putting that thing away?" Weiss asked, both her voice and her legs strained by the weight of Yang clinging onto her shoulder. "I would really appreciate it if Yang didn't have to hide from it anymore."

Ruby gave her partner and her sister a confused and concerned look. "What are you talking about? It's just a tree." She turned to Edward, hoping that he would have an answer. "Do you have any idea why they're acting so weird?"

He just shrugged in response. "I've only known you guys for a few hours. As far as I know, this is how she usually acts."

Ruby's face scrunched up into a look of intense concentration. "No, I've only ever seen Yang like this after we watched a scary movie once, but that was because she had just found out that she was allergic to ghosts."

"You can be allergic to ghosts?" Pyrrha interjected in surprise. "Do ghosts even exist?"

"Yeah I think so," Ruby said as she shrugged. "And yeah, Yang has really bad allergies to ghosts and demons, so much that she'll get sick whenever she even sees one in a movie or hears about one in a scary story."

"Huh," Blake said from the other side of the Yang-Weiss hybrid. "Isn't that interesting." It had only been a day, but she was able to gauge that her partner was the type to tease her acquaintances endlessly. Maybe she'd act differently if that acquaintance had blackmail material.

"Yeah, it is pretty weird." Ruby nodded in agreement, not noticing the grin on the girl's face. " I wonder what could've caused this. I'm pretty sure there weren't any ghosts in the classroom."

"Umm," Jaune said meekly, raising his hand up. "I think it's bec-"

"Actually, I have a question to ask before it becomes irrelevant," Ed said, cutting off Jaune's suggestion. "What's a movie?"

A few collective gasps emerged from within the group as they stopped dead in their tracks. Unfortunately, they were in the middle of a hallway after classes and a sudden halting of nine bodies was sure to cause a disruption in the natural flow of bodies.

"Oof," a small voice said as the owner walked into the large mass.

The group turned around to see a Faunus girl with rabbit ears had just bumped into Jaune's back. There didn't seem to be any damage, but she was still tenderly rubbing her nose.

"Oh, we're so sorry," Pyrrha immediately said, rushing over to the girl. "We shouldn't have stopped so suddenly. Are you okay?"

"I'm fine. Just surprised me, that's all," she said, shaking her head to clear her mind again. When she looked back up at the girl in front of her, her eyes widened for a bit. "Say, you look a little familiar." Pyrrha's smile fell slightly, but before she could open her mouth and reply, the girl continued. "Weren't you the guys doing magic tricks and yelling in Port's class?"

The smile renewed itself on Pyrrha's face before it was replaced with an embarrassed look.

"I guess I got my answer," she said with a polite smile. She turned to face the entire group and gave a small wave. "My name's Velvet. You all seem like an interesting bunch. Hope we get along."

"It's very nice to meet you, Velvet," Blake said, pushing past some of her friends to shake hands with the girl.

Velvet smiled and gave a nod in response. "Well, I'm glad I introduced myself, but I have to get going now. My next class is soon."

Weiss gave a noticeable start at that comment. "What? Most of the first year classes should be done for the day!" In case she had remembered incorrectly, she frantically opened her scroll to try and pull up her schedule.

"Oh, no, I'm headed to a second year class," she said, looking down slightly in embarrassment. "Something happened last year that forced me to miss some of my first semester. I have to retake some tests that I missed the first time around, so I thought I'd attend some of the classes to refresh my memory."

"Oh, then don't let us keep you," Blake said. Velvet nodded in response and scooted around the group, waving as she went.

"Well, she was nice," Ruby said. "I like her."

"Yeah, I was really surprised that she was so nice, to be honest," Jaune spoke up, not noticing the deadly glare that Blake had sent him in response. "From the movies, I always thought that senior students would be bullying the first years. Glad to see that isn't true." He continued to not notice that Blake's glare of death turned into one of embarrassment.

"Speaking of movies," Yang said, surprising Ruby and eliciting a sigh of relief from Weiss.

"Yang! You're alive!" Ruby exclaimed. "What happened? Are you okay now?"

Yang scratched the back of her head. "Actually, I'm not even sure what's going on. Last thing I remember was having this weird dream while I was sleeping in Port's class, and next thing I know, Ed's telling us that he's never heard of a movie before."

"Oh, and here I thought it was an allergic reaction," Blake said slyly.

"Speaking of movies," Yang said, turning her eyes violently away from her partner. "I hear that Ed over here doesn't know what a movie is. That means we have a fresh slate to work with. Any votes on how we should take his first?"

"Oh, the latest Spruce Willis movie was pretty good! We should take him to see that," Jaune spoke up excitedly.

"Oh god, no." Nearly everyone turned to Ren, surprised that he had spoken. He just shrugged as the gazes fell on him. "Sorry, I'm just not a fan."

"Well, I don't see anyone else contributing any ideas," Jaune said with his arms crossed. "And I think Spruce Willis is a great actor, thank you very much."

"Nah, I agree with Ren. Spruce Willis is such an overrated actor, and his movies are really unrealistic." Ren crossed his arms, mirroring Jaune's posture, and almost nodded before he realized it was Nora who was speaking. "Now Maple Bay. There's a guy who knows what life really is."

"Filled with explosions?" Weiss asked. Her only response came in the form of Nora giving her a hard stare, presumably as a punishment for asking such an absurd question.

"Nora, that's stupid. What's the point in watching fake explosions when you could be out there, making your own?" Yang asked. Nora paused for a second, before her expression broke down into a maniacal grin. Ren's face paled at the sight. "Movies are supposed to show you something that you could never experience on your own, that's what makes them interesting."

"Then how about a scary movie?" Blake suggested with an innocent smile. "I'm sure none of us even believe in ghosts, so I'm sure all of us would enjoy it."

"But the most important thing to keep in mind is what the audience wants," she said with her hands tightly locked against her ears. "So Ed, what kind of stories do you like?"

A few eyes followed hers, to see that their newest teammate had a somewhat slack-jawed expression on his face.

"Ed? You okay?" Ruby asked, tapping him on the shoulder. Ed stiffened slightly at the sudden contact, but the concerned expression on her face reminded him that he was among friends and he sighed.

"Before you guys tell me about what movies are, can I ask you something else?" Nobody replied verbally, but he did see a few nods. "About that girl who just talked to us," he started. He had to forcefully remind himself that he was in an entirely different world and that like the recent Dust incident, just because something similar existed in his world didn't mean they were one and the same. "Were those ears natural?"

"Yes. Yes they were," Blake suddenly spoke up with a slight edge to her voice. "She's a Faunus and she's a person."

"So she was born with rabbit ears?" he asked, hoping for a confirmation.

"Yes," she replied. She seemed slightly confused, as if she didn't expect the hopeful tone in his voice, but the hard tone in her own voice didn't fade.

Ed breathed out a sigh of relief. While this world matched his own in the aspect of weaponizing children, he was glad that the concepts of Dust and Faunus were much kinder than the Philosopher's stone and Chimeras in his own world.

"Okay, that's a relief. I've never even heard of Faunus until now, so sorry if my reaction was weird," he said. He bowed slightly in apology before coming back up with a smile. "Now, what's all this about movies?"

* * *

The excitement in the room had died down quickly once the members of RWBY and JNPR had retired to their own rooms for the night, but not before showing him what a "movie" was.

"I'm still pretty certain that you run on magic," Ed mumbled as he glared at the scroll in an attempt to intimidate it into giving him its secrets. Even after learning alchemy or rather, especially after learning alchemy, he had refused to believe in things like "magic." By learning the laws of the universe, you could explain why anything happened and with alchemy, that only reinforced his theory. He sighed. Though he didn't enjoy the fact that he would have to change his entire worldview, magic was the most probable explanation for the things that he had seen in this world.

The scroll was an amazing piece of technology. You could call other scroll users on it, you could send written messages instantly, and like he had just seen, it could project light onto a wall and play movies. But while the moving pictures were certainly shocking to see, with his reaction drawing a few laughs from his new companions, the most impressive function that the scroll had was probably the aura gauge.

Jaune had shown him the function, excited to show him that he had the most aura reserves in the group, but that had backfired when Yang offered to attack him to show off the aura gauge in action. With Jaune's clumsy guard and lack of a weapon, it was quite easy for Yang to get a few hits in before she was satisfied with chipping off around a tenth of his aura. Ed had quickly recognized the familiar bar from earlier in the day, but as he didn't know what aura was at that time he didn't have a chance to analyze it and thus he was grateful for Jaune's sacrifice.

What was most impressive was the fact that Jaune's aura had fully replenished within half a minute of rest despite the less than gentle handling by Yang, a feat that Jaune and his teammates were proud of. Once Ed had synced up his own scroll with his own aura, he was pleased to see that his aura was at full. After his last experiment with aura, he was excited to try and see what else he could do.

Now that the rest of the room was empty, with the only things occupying it being himself, his bed, a desk, and the potted bonsai that Ruby had left behind on the insistence of Yang, he was ready to start.

He over to the bonsai in the center of the room, clapped his hands, mostly out of habit, and placed his hands on the plant and his own chest. A familiar feeling coursed through his body and with a few sparks, the bonsai, pot and all, was replaced by the wooden framework of a couch.

Glancing over to his scroll and praying that his theory was correct, he gave an internal cheer as he saw that the bar had shrunk down by a fraction of its original size. After waiting a few more seconds, he externalized that cheer with a sigh of relief as he saw the bar refilling itself at a snail's pace, but refilling itself nonetheless.

Though he wasn't physically tired at that moment, he fell forwards onto the couch as he felt a huge wave of relief and accomplishment wash over him. Unfortunately for him, he had forgotten about the fact that the couch was only half completed and that he would just fall through the framework if he treated it like a normal couch. And so he fell through. Also unfortunately for him, he had also created the couch structure right next to a wall. If the walls of the room were made to be flimsy due to an architectural design flaw, which would explain why the dorm room was unoccupied in the first place, that would have been especially unfortunate for him. And so it was.

In a short moment of surprise as Edward quickly realized that there was less protection against gravity than he had anticipated, he reluctantly gave up his body to the laws of physics. Toppling over the wooden framework, his legs went over his head and into the wall. While his ankle of flesh collided with the wooden wall painfully, his ankle of steel caused more pain to the wall.

Tearing through the wall, his metal ankle continued to the point where it hit something a bit more solid. That solid something was the metal wiring of the electrical socket. The electric shock coursed through him for a moment before the rest of his body followed his legs and crashed onto the floor, pulling his conductor of a leg away from the electrical source.

"GAH!" Ed screamed as he registered what had just happened. He had experienced much worse pains and this event was relatively painless, but the event was still startling.

A couple of seconds passed as he laid on the floor, embarrassed at his moment of clumsiness, before his scroll rang. The display on the scroll showed that Yang was calling him. He gave a groan at the shame of knowing that his companions had heard the commotion and pressed the button that would connect the call.

"Yo, Ed." A completely unworried voice came from the other side. "You alright over there?"

"Yeah," he said, covering his face with his hands despite the fact that the other person couldn't see him regardless. "Just tripped."

"See, I told you he's fine," Yang's voice said. "Now close the door and leave him alone, Ruby. Let's just all get some sleep, okay?"

"Sorry about that," he apologized with a grimace.

"Nah it's no problem," came the reply. "Now don't have too much fun in there." The display faded, indicating that Yang had ended the call.

Ed fought the urge to bash his head against the wall, lest he wake his neighbours up again, and instead he went with the quieter option of bashing the scroll against his head. After a few moments he calmed down and sat up to analyze the property damage he had caused. It wasn't a very nice scene.

The wall looked like someone had bashed through it with a blunt weapon because, quite frankly, that's exactly what happened. While Ed felt that he could easily fix the wall with a bit of alchemy, he was unsure if he could fix the socket and the wiring. While he could certainly recreate the wires themselves, he wasn't an electrician. He didn't know enough about the placement of the wires to trust himself to repair the damage properly. So he repaired the surrounding wall and left the broken socket untouched, vowing to remember to tell Ozpin about the damage.

He then glared violently at the half-made couch that caused the entire mess.

Standing up, he stalked over to his bed and grabbed one of the pillows, and stalked back over to the wooden framework. With a quick glance at his scroll, he confirmed that his aura had almost replenished to full after creating the first part of the couch. A bit of aura had been drained, presumably from absorbing some of the damage from the electric shock that he received, but it wasn't enough to convince him to take a rest. He clapped his hands together once again to complete the damned couch.

With a few short bursts of energy and alchemical feats using the pillow, Edward had covered the entire framework with cloth, stuffed it, and created the cushions. Staring down smugly at it, he plopped himself down in a show of dominance.

After a few moments of silence and discomfort, he glared at the couch for its final act of annoyance. Standing back up, he motioned to brush the sand off the cushions before he realized that it was very strange for the completely new couch to be covered in sand.

In a moment of realization, he quickly realized that he was the one who was covered in sand. Standing up, he brushed himself off with a frown. There might have been something in the wall that spilled onto him when he broke it open. Finding a particularly annoying grain that had somehow managed to find itself in the seams of his clothes, he started picking at it until it came loose.

Glaring at the thing for giving him such trouble, he narrowed his eyes as he realized that while the small object had a shape that was very similar to crystalline shape of a grain of sand, it also had an unnatural colour.

After a few moments, he had brushed the strange crystals off of his clothes to the point where he felt clean enough and turned away from the couch, conceding defeat to it. Shuffling over to his bed, he plopped himself down, satisfied with the days discoveries and being content enough with his progress to allow himself to slowly drift off to sleep.

As he started to feel the hold of sleep take over his body, he groggily went over the checklist of what he had to do in his mind. First of all, he would have to report the damages to Ozpin, but Ed was confident that he wouldn't be punished too hard for a simple mistake. Secondly, he would learn more about Dust. While he was already overwhelmed after learning more about aura, scroll functions, and movies already, he didn't want to waste any time in getting back home.

He let his eyes wander once more before finally closing them. He knew that the trail of strange crystals that he had left in his wake would bother some people, but he personally didn't mind the mess. Despite that, now that team RWBY and JNPR had appointed his room as a common room, he begrudgingly acknowledged that he would have to clean it up.

But that was for later. He closed his eyes and forgot about the yellow crystals as sleep took over his body.

* * *

 **Author's babbling:**

 **The FMA universe doesn't have anything like video technology, right? I know they don't have most electronics, but I'm a bit paranoid that they used projectors and film reels or something and I just forgot about it… If that's the case, just ignore it please.**

 **No pairings in this fic, at least no pairings that Ed's involved in. No focus on any romance in general. Just to appease any worries that people might have.**

 **A lot of people frozen in shock this chapter.**

 **I am also VERY aware that that last bit was very forced and unnatural. I'm not saying you can't rip on me for it, but be gentle.**

 **Not too happy with this chapter, mainly because I found a major flaw in this story. There's too many people. I'm sure that some of you would argue that that isn't a "real" problem, but I'm sure some of you were annoyed by the excessive amount of people who talk randomly in this chapter. Nine main characters is very hard to deal with which obviously means that, as a lazy writer, I'm going to have to delegate some of RWBY/JNPR to the supporting cast roles.**

 **This will probably mean that I'm pushing Pyrrha, Ren, and Nora to be the supporting cast. Ren and Nora are pretty much likable fillers in the show anyways, and Pyrrha's storyline is pretty much linked to Jaune's until season three and I wasn't planning to dive into their puppy love anyways so she'd be pretty easy to push aside too.**

 **In a perfect world, I'd push Blake out too as she's one of my least liked characters in the entire show, but as long as the White Fang is involved she'd obviously be involved too. The fact that almost her entire character is based around her being a Faunus is so terrible and I hate it.**

 **Weiss is one of my favourites, but she probably won't have too much of a role in the story. One review sort of begged to not make this into a WeissxEdward thing and if you're reading this, I assure you that won't be the case. Sorry if the Weiss spotlight in the last chapter gave off that sort of a vibe, but I don't think I'll ever touch upon romance in this fic. It also highlights the fact that I haven't fully determined how Ed will interact with everyone and who he'll talk to the most.**

 **Ruby's obviously remaining as one of the more important characters, I just like Yang and she's the type of character who would probably help out Ed in whatever shenanigans anyways.**

 **Jaune's a bit complicated. He's also one of my favourites (I'm a sucker for character's who are themed around growth) and I'm sure he'd be fine to include into the story once Jaunedice passes, but Jaunedice is kind of an awkward problem. If I make Ed a bystander, there's not really a point in writing the damn thing anyways, but without Jaunedice happening, Jaune remains a super wimp. I'm sure I'll figure something out but it's pretty annoying to think about.**

 **Also, Ed's kind of been silent relative to how he normally acts, but I don't plan to have him have this OoC attitude for long. Rather, I never planned for him to be so broody in the first place, but I'm not skilled enough to make his introduction to the RWBY universe very organic. So we might be seeing more blatant exposition and defining of his unique interactions with the new laws of the RWBY universe. Hopefully, it won't take too much longer.**

 **Hopefully.**

 **See you all in a month or so. You guys might not be getting an update for a long time. I've been wanting to try my hand at Nanowrimo for a while now, so I might be working on something else entirely for the month of November. Of course, school is still a thing so I might be too busy to try Nanowrimo, but hopefully for me I'll be able to manage it. I guess it would be bad for you guys, but I'm a very selfish person. See ya'll next time.**


	7. Chapter 7

**So Battlerite is a really really fun game.**

 **I didn't look over this chapter so it might have some awkward wording, grammatical mistakes, spelling errors, etc. I might edit it later. I seem to especially have a problem with capitalization of aura and semblance. Sometimes I do and sometimes I forget which may annoy some of you. Sorry.  
**

* * *

"Ugh."

The blond boy groaned as the closing door smacked his face gently as he failed to put the effort into raising his arms to catch it. He didn't bother to raise his arms to push it away either, electing instead to use the forward motion of his shuffling gait to ease himself past the door.

The girl behind him huffed in annoyance before she kicked the door open, her hands occupied by her younger sister and leader that was currently sprawled onto her back in a semi-conscious state.

"Why won't anyone carry me like that?" Jaune asked in a dull tone of voice, too tired to actually insert any emotion into his voice and not awake enough to feel apologetic for letting the door close behind him.

"Oh, stop complaining," Weiss spoke up, from behind Yang. "A hunter should be ready for anything at any time, including early mornings." Though she was speaking as a response to Jaune's complaint, she glared intently at her partner's perfect impression of a cape on her sister's back.

"To be fair, Jaune didn't manage to get much sleep last night either," Pyrrha spoke from the front of the line. "He hasn't been able to rest for as long as the rest of us and he must be more tired, especially after what happened during initiation."

"Ruby too," Yang added, shooting Weiss a dirty look. "I don't think you should be so harsh on either of them."

Weiss sighed and crossed her arms, but didn't offer any further response.

"Sorry everybody." Ed raised his hand with a nonchalant look on his face. "You wouldn't have had to go to class so early in the morning if it weren't for me."

"Your circumstances were unavoidable. There is no reason to apologize." Ren spoke up. Ed shrugged, but still gave him an appreciative look. The young student had no reason to be there but had accompanied them anyways in his school uniform, matching Edward's own attire, but looking out of place when compared to the rest of the group who were all fitted in their customized clothing.

Finally, they had all managed to file past the doors and into the training arenas. Ren had already fought before Ed's emergency situation had forced the nine students to leave immediately, so he had been exempt from the makeup class, but he had woken up all the same, giving the excuse that he hadn't had the chance to analyze his friends' fighting styles properly. The rest of them had no such excuse and though most of them were actually eager to test their skills against one another, the two tired leaders didn't share the same enthusiasm as they had their sleep stolen from them for the second night in a row.

"Students," a sharp voice spoke up from the elevated platform. Though they couldn't see the owner of the voice, they recognized Professor Goodwitch's voice and even Jaune snapped to attention. Wasting no time, she continued. "The first round of combat will be between Jaune Arc and Edward Elric. The rest of you may seat yourselves wherever you wish."

The two in question shared a short look, before they proceeded to walk up to the stage, leaving behind the rest of the group.

"You sure you're up for fighting, Ed?" Jaune asked in a nervous voice. "I mean you were just in the infirmary, I don't want to sound pushy but…"

"I'm fine, it wasn't anything serious," Ed replied, waving a hand dismissively.

Jaune gave a shrug, looking slightly unconvinced. "Well either way, let's have a good fight," he said, giving Ed a nervous grin and held out a hand.

Ed stared at him for a second before realizing that Jaune wanted him to shake it. With a little start, he grabbed his hand and nodded before Jaune nodded back and proceeded up the stairs. Ed took a moment to follow as he had just realized that it had been ages since he had a fight that wasn't a duel to the death. There would be no blood or hatred. It felt nice.

He stepped up to the platform to see that Jaune had taken his place at the far end, with a sword in his hand and a shield in the other. Professor Goodwitch motioned to a spot not far from where he currently was, and he walked over.

"Mr. Elric," she spoke up as he claimed his spot. "Will you be alright with sparring in your school uniform?"

He shrugged. "It's a bit annoying to move in, but honestly I don't really have a choice. Until I can get my hands on some materials, I don't exactly have any other clothes."

She nodded. "Very well, for now it will do," she said. "And your lack of a weapon?" she asked, observing that he hadn't brought any tools with him.

"It's fine, I'm used to it," he replied. "If I need one, I'll just make my own."

She nodded again in response. Seemingly satisfied with Ed's questioning, she turned to Jaune instead. "And you Mr. Arc? Do you have any concerns about this fight?"

Jaune didn't say anything for a moment and just scratched his head. "Are you sure this is safe?" he finally asked. "I mean no offence to you, Ed, but it feels weird to be using a weapon against someone who doesn't have one."

"I said I'm fine," Ed spoke up, feeling a bit annoyed at this point. He didn't hate the concern that these people seemed to have for him, but an overdose of anything was never a good thing.

"To expel any further fears or concerns that you or anyone else may have and to remind everyone of how these fights will proceed," Professor Goodwitch said, calmly interrupting Jaune before he could reply. "The spar will stop once one person's Aura levels have decreased below fifteen percent of their maximum capacity in order to minimize risk. I trust your teammates have given you a more detailed explanation of Aura, Mr. Elric?" she said, interrupting her own explanation. After a nod of confirmation from Edward, she continued. "Furthermore, if I feel that anybody is in any danger I will not hesitate to interrupt."

Jaune's nod was hesitant, but he seemed to be reassured enough to face Ed and assume an awkward battle stance.

"Are both combatants ready?" Professor Goodwitch asked. When both fighters nodded, she took a step back. "Very well, you may begin."

* * *

Neither of the two moved immediately after her words. Weiss watched as Edward eyed Jaune up and down, presumably to try any decipher clues about his fighting style. Despite herself, she couldn't help but be amused at the fact that Edward was giving the obviously unexperienced fighter so much respect.

She noted that Edward held a strange fascination for the knight's longsword and shield, even as the owner of said weapons came charging at him with a wild yell.

She heard a few of the audience members mirror her groan as Jaune launched his amateur attack. She cringed as she remembered that he had become the leader of his own team over Pyrrha Nikos while she hadn't, but she actively tried to force those thoughts down. There was nothing wrong with not being made leader, she reminded herself.

But before she could repeat the mantra to herself, she heard the clang of metal against stone as Jaune's sword hit the ground after Edward had dodged the attack in an almost casual manner, as if he were playing with a small child.

But even if there's nothing wrong with not being leader of my team, there must be something wrong about that doofus being made the leader of his team, Weiss thought, amending the mantra that she had learned after she had decided to be nicer to Ruby.

She was glad that she was not being overly critical as she heard a few sighs from the rest of team RWBY and JNPR. The scene was quite ridiculous actually. Edward had jumped a good distance away from Jaune after the initial dodge with a wary look in his eyes, while Jaune had a look of shock in his own as if he was absolutely certain that his sloppy attack would hit.

In fact, that swing was probably the worst thing he could have done. Weiss noted that Jaune's back was turned to Edward and would never have been able to counterattack or even block against any potential attacks.

Despite that, Edward didn't attack. Weiss's first instinct was to internally criticize Edward's inability to recognize such an easy opportunity, but his expression made her think otherwise. He didn't seem clueless or nervous, he just seemed to be wary and careful as if Jaune could grow a third arm from his back and retaliate with that.

In a short moment, Jaune had been able to gather himself and charge at Edward again, taking a swing that was so identical to the last that it was hard to say whether it was impressive or sad.

After Edward casually dodged the swing and the two that followed, she decided that it was sad.

"He's a lot better than I thought he'd be," Yang mused, mirroring Weiss's own train of thought.

"What makes you say that?" she asked absentmindedly. She had her own answer in mind, but remained curious as to what her teammate thought.

"He's only had aura for less than a day," Yang replied. "He might have that weird thing that he uses, but without Aura I can't imagine he'd be able to survive many serious fights."

Weiss nodded, agreeing with the blonde. The best way to develop your fighting prowess was to fight, whether it be in actual combat or simple sparring, and even sparring between hunters was something that could easily become life threatening if either party didn't have access to Aura. So Edward's obvious comfort in combat was a mystery to her.

Before she could think any further, a loud yell dragged her out of her own thoughts. Looking down, she saw Jaune charging once again, somehow expecting a different result despite using the same tactic that he had been using previously.

To her surprise, something different did happen. Apparently tired of dodging, she saw Edward clapping his hands together in a motion that she recognized from Ozpin's office. Her attention was suddenly focused on what he would do.

At the very last moment Edward stepped toward his charging opponent, visibly surprising the knight, and placed a hand almost gently on the side of his sword.

Blue sparks seemed to burst from Edward's hands and onto the sword. Weiss could hear a few gasps around her and vaguely registered that she was holding her own breath, curious as to what would happen next.

When nothing happened she felt a tinge of disappointment, but not to the extent that Edward seemed to feel, judging from the look on his own face.

"What?" Jaune said dumbly from the center of the stage. He drew back from the source of the sparks instinctively and gave his sword a quick glance, ensuring that it was in working condition, before assuming the same confused expression that everybody else seemed to have.

"It's nothing," Edward said, shrugging his shoulders. "I was just trying out something."

When he made no further comment, Jaune shrugged back and readied himself for another charge. Weiss felt a bit of relief as she saw Edward's expression harden, hopefully with the intention of ending the idiotic display of what Jaune would call, swordplay.

As Jaune made what Weiss hoped to be his final attack, she saw that Edward had clapped his hands together again, but remained motionless until Jaune was nearly upon him. When he did move, it was to put his left hand onto his right arm. Weiss didn't expect the look of shock on Edward's face as he did this, as if he had just remembered something important.

Jaune's sword crashed into Edward's body, though the younger fighter did manage to soften the blow with his arm. Weiss looked up to see that Edward's aura had dropped by around fifteen, admittedly an impressive feat for a blocked attacked. If nothing, Jaune did seem to have some dumb strength.

Out of her peripheral view she saw a familiar blue light, but before she could check to see the source, her jaw dropped as Jaune's Aura meter dropped by around fifty percent in an instant and the loud beep of the display system indicated that the match was over by ring out, judging from the fact that both fighters were still at relatively healthy aura levels. Looking back down, she saw that half a dozen giant stone pillars had appeared out of nowhere and that Jaune was sprawled over at wall of the arena at the opposite end of where the two had been battling previously.

Weiss knew that her mouth was open, but she couldn't muster the will to bring her jaw back up. She was no stranger to hunters and military technology, but a single attack that could drastically deplete a hunter's Aura was incredibly rare, especially if that hunter had an impressive Aura capacity like Jaune. Though she suspected that the blond knight hadn't guarded the attack, that attack should still have been expensive in terms of monetary expense or energy usage. Judging from the casual posture that Edward held as he turned to the audience with a cocky grin on his face, he had paid neither of these costs.

"Damn," Yang whispered, expressing her own feelings perfectly if not for the excited tone that she heard in her teammate's voice.

"And that's the match," Professor Goodwitch said as she approached the center of the arena. Jaune only groaned in response. "Will Ms. Xiao Long approach the stage, and will somebody help Mr. Arc off the stage?"

With a small whoop of joy, Yang jumped from her seat and rocketed towards the platform. Pyrrha copied the motion, but aimed her landing to land next to her nearly unconscious partner. In one smooth motion, she managed to gently stand the boy up and sling one of his arms over her shoulders.

Edward started to walk over to the two, presumably to help his victim out, but was stopped by a quick word from Professor Goodwitch.

"Not you, Mr. Elric," she stated firmly. "You will be required to fight a round with Ms. Xiao Long before returning to the audience. We currently have no information about your combat prowess and we'll need you to fight a few rounds so we can gauge your relative strength with the rest of the first-years."

"Woah, I get to fight against that?" Yang exclaimed as she stepped onto the platform. "Lucky me!"

"What even happened to me?" Jaune asked Pyrrha as they walked up to where Weiss and the rest of their teams were sitting.

"You got creamed," Nora said with a wide smile. "Wasn't even a contest."

"Nora…" Ren said sternly as Jaune groaned.

"What? I'm not making fun of him. It's just the truth," she replied with a shrug.

"You shouldn't feel bad, about your loss," Pyrrha suggested as she took her own seat beside her leader. "It was the first time that any of us had seen how Ed fights and it certainly was unique. I don't doubt that most of us would be caught off guard if we were in your situation." As much as Weiss hated to admit it, Pyrrha's words were completely right. Though she still didn't think that Jaune's performance was anything but abysmal, she couldn't confidently say that she would have been victorious with such devastating attacks in Edward's arsenal.

"Honestly, I still don't know how he fights," Jaune admitted. "One moment I had knocked him down, and then I was knocked out a second later. I don't even know what happened."

Pyrrha gestured to the center of the arena as Yang took her position at one side of the platform, bouncing impatiently as she waited for the match to start. A few words were exchanged between Professor Goodwitch and Ed and he could see Ed nodding a few times, before he walked to the center of the stage and laid his hands on the set of large stone pillars. Jaune didn't seem to recognize them at first, but the way that his hands went to automatically cover his face told Weiss that his body seemed to remember.

He looked at Pyrrha with a confused expression as a blue spark of energy emanated from Ed's hands and the pillars seemed to sink back into the ground. "I'm not too clear about what happened either," Pyrrha admitted. "I've never seen that kind of attack either, but I'm sure it has something to do with the strange ability that he has."

The explanation didn't appease Weiss's curiosity, but once she realized that Jaune had stopped asking questions, she decided to watch the next match with more care instead of relying on other people's explanations.

* * *

Yang did a quick scan of Ed's posture as he walked to his end of the arena after fixing the damage that he did with his last attack. Was it even considered damage if you added to the arena instead of destroying parts of it? Yang ignored the quick question, though she vowed to think about the answer later, and turned her attention back to the younger boy in front of her.

She almost amended her previous thought as she analyzed him more. She couldn't see him being an year younger than her. He didn't assume any stance that she recognized, but from the way he carried himself, she could tell that he had many years of experience under his belt.

But she didn't let that disturb her in any way. She didn't completely understand what he had done to defeat Jaune as the knight's body had blocked her view of the attack at the time and she also understood that he was obviously no pushover.

But then again, neither was she.

She crashed her fists against each other as she heard Glynda ask if she was ready. She nodded with a wild grin on her face as Ed nodded as well.

"Just to let you know, you shouldn't underestimate me," she said as Glynda called the beginning of the match. "I'm nothing like Vomit Boy over there."

Even as a short "Hey!" came from the audience seats, Ed gave a small grin. "Why don't you go ahead and show me?"

Yang's grin seemed to evolve into something more fierce. She always loved to answer that request with all that she had.

* * *

Ed knew that Yang was much stronger than his previous opponent.

While he had overestimated Jaune due to his sloppy posture and Ed's own bad experiences with people who loved to employ unorthodox fighting, Yang wore her battle prowess on her sleeve.

She held a confident but familiar striker's stance, with her fists out in front of her, ready to guard or punch as needed. He had faced many fighters who assumed a similar stance and he knew that her own posture and stance indicated that she wasn't a stranger to battle like Jaune had been. She seemed like the type who would be the first to strike, and he recognized that the first strike was one of the most important. It could set the pace for the battle, and could be incredibly advantageous to gain the upper hand in the first exchange. He lowered his own stance, readying him self for any attack that would be sent in his direction. Whatever she threw at him, he would be ready.

Most of his assumptions were correct. The last one was not.

Ed felt a tinge of surprise when Yang readied herself to take a punch, but didn't expect her to hit nothing but air, not even bothering to take a step towards him. The yelp of surprise left his mouth before he even registered the glowing bullet that rocketed towards him as he dived out of the way. He managed to dodge the bullet but he felt the heat of a small explosion behind him stagger him off balance.

Before he could gather himself again, he saw a fist coming towards him from his peripheral vision. He had no idea how Yang had crossed the distance so quickly, but at that point it didn't really matter.

He was only able to barely tilt his head out of the way. The gauntleted fist grazed by him, clipping his ear on the way, but not making any solid hit. Unfortunately for Ed, the follow up strike hit him solidly in the stomach.

It was much weaker than he had expected as the concept of Aura still relatively new to him, but it still managed to knock some of the wind out of him. However, hard hits were something he was experienced in.

He managed to jump back with the blow, minimizing any damage that it may have caused, but unfortunately for him, Yang didn't let that bother her. She turned her body to follow his and was less than a second away from getting another hit in.

It was way too little time for Ed to try and something the traditional way, but he remembered something critical. He knew someone that could use alchemy without even moving a muscle. That person could only do that because he was a humanized Philosopher's Stone but then again, so was Edward.

It was a bit strange to transmute something through his feet, but it wasn't enough to impede his performance.

Yang suddenly found herself trapped in a large birdcage that seemed to sprout out of the ground and impede her path to her opponent.

"Well this is new," she said with a calm voice despite the forced pause in combat.

"Ready to give up now?" Ed asked in a cocky manner, hoping that he didn't look as sweaty as he felt.

Even from within her prison, Yang didn't seem to think that the battle had turned in Ed's favour in any way. "Are you kidding me?" she asked in a teasing voice. "We haven't even gotten started yet. What's the rush?"

Ed's only response was to clap his hands together, mostly out of habit at this point, and reach down to the ground to transmute a stone spear.

Yang's eyes widened as he pointed it towards her, though her expression implied that she was just surprised and not afraid of the sharp tip. "You know, even when I see it up I still don't understand what you're doing," she commented. She then narrowed her eyes towards the spear, as if she had just realized that she was trapped and in danger. "Well, I'm sure that even if I did understand what you were doing, my plan would be the same either way." She reared back and before Ed could react to what she was doing, she simply punched the wall.

And though she punched the wall simply, Ed was blown back by the accompanying explosion.

* * *

Ruby didn't dare to take her attention away from the fight. She had just fully woken up to the sounds and the sight of Yang punching her way out of a birdcage. Ruby had almost fallen asleep there and then in an attempt to ward away the unfamiliar dream, but the heat that she felt from the arena was not something that she normally felt in a dream.

She had snapped to attention, her vision trying to focus on the scene to determine if Yang was causing enough trouble to need to call their dad to try and talk to the police. Once she recognized the vaguely familiar arena, she made the association between the fight and class and calmed down. But once she realized that it was Yang fighting, she urged herself to pay attention and cheer if needed. And once she realized that Yang's opponent was her new weaponless friend, her tinkerer's mind flared with excitement.

She then became fully invested in watching the fight, she looked down to try and absorb Ed's fighting style and think of an amazing weapon design that could complement it perfectly. She would think of how to convince him to use it later.

After she actually started to watch the fight, all of her previous thoughts were washed away.

She didn't know if she was amazed or simply confused about what was happening down below. Yang was charging towards Ed with a threatening fist of flame as she did with most opponents, and Ed was doing his best to create as much distance as he could, which was what most of Yang's sensible opponents tended to do. That was a familiar sight, but the fact that the battlefield itself seemed to be changing around them threw her off.

From what she could tell, the battlefield seemed to be attacking her sister and helping Ed. She frowned as the thought of Yang somehow insulting the battlegrounds itself crossed her mind, but she quickly shook the thought away. Her sister could definitely be rude, but even she knew when too far was too far.

"Raargh!" Yang yelled with a frustrated tone of voice. It was a special type of roar that Yang only made when she was trying to fight particularly annoying opponents that were too frustrating to fight against. While Ruby was usually the one to instigate the roar during their spars with her ability to speed around the battlefield, Ed used a very different tactic of bombarding Yang with an arsenal of morphing stone and steel, forcing her to dodge or punch through the offending pillars. She could tell from her expression that Yang was imagining Ed's face on each of the pillars.

"Stop." Yang punched through another stone pillar. "Running." She dodged another pillar after judging that its steel composition would be too painful for punching. "Away!" She stepped forward and a pillar seemed to emerge from underneath her, threatening to bash her chin. She reacted by stepping onto the rising pillar, using its force to launch herself up into the air.

Ruby could have sworn she heard Ed screaming a girlish shriek as Yang set her crimson eyes onto him. In a practiced motion Yang pointed her fists directly away from Ed and fired, the extra momentum pushing her towards the terrified looking boy.

The battlefield was a bit obscured with the absurd amount of out-of-place pillars and rubble, forcing Ruby and the rest of the curious students to stand up, crane their necks, or move a few seats in order to get a better view of the close combat battle.

Ruby was impressed to find that Ed had caught Yang's fist in his hand, but was not surprised to see that Yang was not perturbed and had continued to use her free hand to pound on his midsection. Ed jumped backwards in reaction, creating a small wall in between them to cover his retreat, but it proved to be useless as Yang burst through the wall and punched Ed's face with a solid blow, sending him careening into the floor.

"That's enough!" Professor Goodwitch's voice rung out from the edges of the rubble. Yang's crimson eyes instantly faded to their original lilac colour as she bent down to help Ed up. He gave a small start, but relaxed quickly and accepted her offered hand, letting her pull him to his feet.

"Now will both fighters return to their seats," Professor Goodwitch said as she finished writing something on a clipboard that she held in her hands. "You may return to your seat, Mr. Elric," she said, interrupting Ed as he started to head towards the jungle of stone pillars that he had created. "It is a bit unorthodox, but one of the many purposes of combat classes is to prepare students for fighting in any situation. We might as well use this unique battleground to our advantage."

Ruby watched as Ed nodded and turned back around to follow Yang to the audience seats as Blake and Pyrrha were called down to fight next. She turned her attention to her sister as she climbed up the steps, smiling when they made eye contact.

"Look who's finally awake," Yang said teasingly as she claimed the empty seat next to Ruby. "Did you wake up fast enough to catch my fight? Wasn't it super cool?"

Ruby's eyes lit up.

Yes. It was very cool, and Yang would be the first to hear about how cool it was.

* * *

Weiss watched Ruby pour her soul out to Yang. She held a bit of pity for Yang but easily stifled it, considering that Yang had carelessly opened the floodgates herself. She also felt a bit of jealousy for the fact that Ruby could literally smother her older sister with attention and receive it all back.

But those feelings were dampened by the fact that she had been as excited by the fight that Ruby had been. She had seen Yang fight before, but Edward's fighting style was unique and very flashy. She suspected that she may have been able to defeat him as well, but it was quite a show and she had no problems with admitting it.

Not expecting Ruby to stop her rant any time soon, she turned her attention back to Edward, who had just placed himself two seats away from her. He seemed tired, which was perfectly reasonable seeing as he had just sparred twice in a row, but he also seemed confused.

He looked down into the palm of his right hand. She couldn't see what exactly he was staring at, but she could determine that with twelve percent of his aura remaining it wouldn't be an injury of any sort. Perhaps it was something related to his failed attempt at using his power against Jaune's sword, she concluded. Could he only use his strange power against certain objects? Was it just a misfire that happened occasionally? She wanted to ask him herself, but she still felt a bit awkward with talking to Edward.

In truth, the little argument that they had the previous day did leave a mark on her, but apparently it was based on some sort of misunderstanding. Truth be told, she still didn't understand what he had meant at the time, but it was refreshing to see someone apologize for their mistakes in such an honest manner. She had completely forgiven him and she could tell that he had been genuinely sorry for offending her.

It's just that forgiveness and understanding were a generally new topic for her.

Edward turned to her, catching her gaze. She didn't bother to hide the fact that she had been staring at him, seeing as he didn't seem to care. "Hey Weiss, could you get Yang's attention for me?" Weiss nodded and turned around to tap Yang on the shoulder.

"Hold on, Ruby. Hey Weiss, what's up?" Yang said.

"It looks like Edward want to speak to you," Weiss said, jerking a thumb at their mutual teammate.

"Hey Ed, what's up?" Yang said again.

"So Yang, we both know you won," he started.

"Hell yeah I did," she replied with a grin. "But don't be discouraged Eddy boy, I'm sure you'll get good enough to play with the big kids some day."

"Don't listen to her," Ruby interrupted, forcing Yang to stop talking by pulling her collar back and choking her in a comical fashion. "You did really great! I was so surprised by how you fought! I'm sure you could beat Yang on a good day, she just likes to brag."

"It's okay Ruby," he said. "I don't really care about who won or lost when it's just a spar. I got really used to losing against my sparring partner at home anyways."

"You had a sparring partner?" Ruby asked. Weiss wasn't too surprised by the revelation. He did seem incredibly comfortable with battling. "Did he fight like you do?"

Edward gave a small grimace, one that Weiss barely noticed. "Eh, that's not important right now. Can you let go of Yang? I still need to ask her something."

"Oh, sorry," Ruby said, letting go of Yang's collar and letting her back up.

"Hey Ed, what's up?" Yang said with a cheeky grin.

"Yang, I know fighting against me may have been annoying." Yang nodded but didn't interrupt. "But could you not hold a grudge against me?"

Yang looked at Ruby with a confused look. Weiss learned a lot about Yang, just from the fact that Ruby's expression seemed to scream, "what did you do?"

"What did I do?" Yang asked.

Edward held out his hand to Yang with his palm up. Curious about what Yang had done to his palm, Weiss followed everybody else's gaze though she did try to hide her curiosity. She recognized the object in his palm, but didn't understand why it was there.

"Oh," Yang said, scratching her cheek with an embarrassed look. "Didn't realize that my dust cartridges were loose, sorry for making you play janitor. You know what, you can keep it as a souvenir if you want."

Edward gave her an incredulous look in response. "Does it look like I want to keep it?"

"Oh yeah, that's right. You don't use dust, I guess it would be useless for you."

Edward sighed. "Can you just take it off my hands already?"

"Sure thing," she said as she grabbed for the dust crystal.

A short moment passed with no-one saying anything. The loud clangs of metal against metal resounded from the center of the room. Yang's hand remained on top of Edward's

"Huh?" she finally said.

Weiss watched her tug at the crystal and try to take it out of Edward's hands, but Edward's hands just moved with the crystal.

"It's stuck," she said simply. "Why is it stuck?"

"You mean you didn't do this on purpose?" Edward asked.

"I don't even know what this is," Yang said in response.

Weiss sighed. "Let me see," she said, annoyed at the fact that this clumsy exchange of dust was happening right in front of her. Even if it was in it's more stable crystalline form, dust was not a children's toy.

Yang let go of the dust crystal, took Edward's wrist, and presented Edward's palm to Weiss.

"Here," Yang said. "I'm handing this problem over to you."

Weiss groaned at the lame joke, a sentiment shared by both Edward and Ruby though Ruby just seemed to look off into the distance with a blank stare instead of expressing it outwardly.

She looked at Edward's palm, determined to give her full attention to the "problem" and none of it to Yang's annoying grin.

What she saw confused her. She was no stranger to dust and even considered herself to be very experienced in all aspects regarding dust. As a hunter, she knew how to utilize it. As a student, she knew about its properties. As the heiress to the largest Dust company in Remnant, she knew the logistics to grading and handling dust. So the dust that sat in the palm of Edward's hands was not a complete mystery. She knew that it was a standard crystal of Burn dust, probably with a quality grade of D as far as she could tell.

So the actual crystal itself wasn't a problem. It was the shape of the crystal.

Uncommonly shaped crystals weren't uncommon. Whether they formed in a strangely shaped crevice or miners decided to have fun and make their own designs while drilling the crystals out of the caves, some crystals just had an odd shape. Usually hunters would assume that all Dust was created with the same shape since crystals were usually cut down and molded to fit factory standards to increase the ease of loading them into weapon cartridges.

But even if some factory manager had missed a single crystal during, and if that crystal had been formed in an oddly shaped cavern or mined by a bored and creative worker, that didn't explain the unnatural shape that this crystal took.

The crystal was wrapped around Edward's fingers, making small points that resembled the licks of a flame and in the part of the crystal that sat his palm there was an indent of a fist.

"This is strange," she muttered under her breath.

"Can you fix it?" Edward asked, reminding her of her purpose.

"Of course," she said, a bit flustered. She wasn't lying. Dust was a finicky thing and she had seen similar things happen to her own weapon, where the dust stuck to the insides of her dust chambers. The fact that it had happened to a human body part was just new.

With a practiced motion, she laid both hands onto the dust crystal and injected a precise amount of aura. She wanted to interact with the dust to the point where she could manipulate it, but not to the point where she would activate it.

After a few moments, the lengths of crystal that wrapped around Edward's fingers had curled back enough for him to comfortably be able to pull his hand out.

"Whew, thanks a bunch, Weiss," he said, scratching the palm of his hand.

"Don't mention it, Edward," she said with a smile. "And I'm sorry for refusing to talk to you after yesterday's argument," she continued, surprising both him and herself.

"You apologized to me already," he said, waving his hand with a smile. "I already told you it's fine."

"Yes, but I didn't really mean it back then," she admitted.

"Aww, that's so cute. The little Ice Queen is finally learning to talk to people," Yang said, suddenly appearing from behind Weiss and giving her a hug. Surprised at the unexpected contact, Weiss jerked forwards and the crystal flew from her hands.

Weiss's first instinct was to curse her luck as she unintentionally continued her streak of making disruptions in class. Her second instinct was to hold her hands out in front of her in preparation for the explosion that the unstable crystal was sure to make. It was a small crystal, so she knew it wouldn't do any serious damage, but she knew that it would do some damage and she wanted to stay in the best shape possible for her upcoming spar.

The crystal did explode, the sound shocking everybody in the room enough to divert their attention to the area of the room that the sound originated from.

"Students," Professor Goodwitch's voice rang clear from the edge of the arena. "It is in your best interests to analyze the fights, but if you do not wish to observe, please keep your activities nondisruptive."

Weiss's face flushed at the words and tried to sink into her chair, but found that Yang's arms were still wrapped around her shoulders, stopping her from hiding. She glared at the offender to which she received an awkward grin.

"Sorry, Miss G," Yang said, relieving Weiss of the need to apologize. "Won't happen again."

Professor Goodwitch sighed but made no further comment. "You may continue your match," she said to Blake and Pyrrha who had remained in a temporary after the explosion.

As they launched back into action, Weiss smacked Yang's arm and forced them off of her. She turned to glare at her again, hoping that Yang would just melt under her gaze. Yang just gave a weak laugh.

"Wait, wait," Edward said, stopping the harsh scolding before it happened. "Before you start, I need some help again."

Weiss turned around to see Edward hold both of his hands up with a strained grin. A red dust crystal was wrapped around his fingers.

"How…" Weiss just stared at Edward. "You…"

"I swear it's not on purpose," he said, waving his hands until he remembered that an explosive substance was attached firmly to them. "I just tried to stop the explosion from spreading and this happened."

Even as she reached over and repeated the process to free Edward's hands from the crystal, this time making sure that Yang wouldn't randomly hug her again, she pondered about what had even happened. It took Weiss a few seconds before she made the connection, but Yang was just a second faster.

"Does this have anything to do with your weird power?" she asked.

Edward frowned and considered it for a moment. "I don't think so," he finally said.

"Then maybe it's a Semblance?" Yang suggested again. "You did say that your weird power isn't related to Aura in any way, right?"

Edward shrugged. "I wouldn't know if it was a Semblance. I honestly don't even fully understand what a Semblance is," he admitted. "And it's not a weird power. It's called alchemy."

Weiss thought about Yang's suggestion. If it wasn't related to his power - alchemy as he called it - the only other option was a Semblance. That she was sure of. There was no other plausible explanation for Edward's ability to seemingly create dust from energy, instead of the other way around.

Well, there was only one way to test it.

"Edward," Weiss said, as she drew Myrtenaster. "Whatever you did to Yang's fire and this explosion, I want you to do to this attack."

"Umm, Weiss?" Edward asked with a shaky voice. "What do you mean by that?"

Weiss didn't bother to give an obvious answer and let the forming glyph reply for her instead. From behind her, she heard Yang slowly backing away.

"I'm going to use Wind dust," she explained in a calm voice, despite Edward's obvious panic. "Even if my theory is wrong and you can't block it, the worst that can happen is that you'll be blown to the other side of the room. So nothing too serious," she added as a small reassurance.

Not waiting for a reply, she let her aura surge through her weapon and into the green vial of dust. She felt some of the dust being used up as a concentrated blast of wind erupted from the tip of the rapier.

Edward held up his hands in an instinctual defensive response and Weiss noted that he was being blown back, but was pleased to see that he wasn't flying across the room.

She stopped her attack and walked over briskly to Edward and inspected his hands. Much to her satisfaction, his hands were coated in a light layer of green dust.

"Congratulations," she said, placing Myrtenaster back onto her belt. "Your Semblance seems to be something similar to energy conversion or dust creation. Of course you'll have to do some more tests to determine it's exact nature, but it's a start."

"Does everybody find out what their Semblances are by getting assaulted?" Edward asked incredulously.

"My Semblance makes me stronger whenever I get hit," Yang offered. "So you could probably guess my answer."

"My Semblance makes me really fast," Ruby said in an attempt to discourage Edward from assuming that physical trauma was a necessary evil in Semblance discovery. "I discovered it when I thought our dog was running away from home."

"Ms. Schnee," an irritated voice came from the arena. "Though I understand that you want to use your skills, the audience seats is not an appropriate place for combat. You will be participating in the next round of combat, so please stay patient."

Weiss blushed furiously. "So sorry Professor," she blurted out. "It won't happen again."

Professor Goodwitch let out a big sigh, but didn't offer any other verbal response.

"And that's the match," she said casually, ignoring Weiss's words and instead turning her attention to the center of the platform where Pyrrha had one knee firmly planted onto Blake stomach and her rifle pointed directly at her head. In a quick motion, Milo was tucked back away onto Pyrrha's back and her hand was extended towards Blake. Blake took her hand gratefully.

"As we have an odd number of combatants remaining, we will be having a two versus one round," Professor Goodwitch said as the two previous combatants started to walk offstage. "To make the battle fairer, the group of two will not be allowed to use dust or ammunition. Ms. Schnee will be battling against both Ms. Rose and Ms. Valkyrie."

Weiss's eyes widened at the news, and turned to see Ruby giving her a surprised but apologetic smile. Nora on the other hand, had a manic grin on her face and was currently dragging her thumb across her neck.

At that point, Weiss vowed to never disrupt Professor Goodwitch's class ever again.

* * *

 **If you're getting WeissxEdward vibes from this thing, I'm sorry and I assure you it's never going to happen. I don't know how it turned out this way and I'm not even sure if I'm reading too much into my own story, but if you think there's going to be romance I'm going to disappoint you now. And if you don't want romance, I'm dispelling your fears. No pairings here.**

* * *

 **So about that month long break I was gonna take from this story, that's not happening anymore.**

 **Originally, I had mentioned that I was "taking a month off" from writing this story because I wanted to do Nanowrimo. If you don't know what Nanowrimo is, it stands for "National Novel Writing Month" and it's a worldwide event where you take the entirety of November to make a novel that's at least 50,000 words in length. It's a fun little event for charity and for promoting creative writing.**

 **I probably would have benefitted from that explanation too, since I had assumed it was a writing contest.**

 **So long story short, I'm still gonna keep the goal of writing 50,000 words by the end of the month to complete the challenge, but I'm not going to care too much about the novel itself, and divide my attentions between this and the novel.**

 **Probably more attention will be given to the novel, but at around 1700 words a day, I'm assuming that I might be able to update this fic a few times this month.**

 **No promises. Surprise updates are nice, but it's nice to have an explanation.**

* * *

 **Not much to rant about with this chapter, though I can't say I'm too happy with it. I don't really like written fight scenes in general to be honest, whether it's reading or writing them, so I have a real bias against them. Hopefully I won't need to write an entire chapter that's based on fight scenes again. Originally, the entire chapter was going to be third person limited solely from Ed's perspective, which was even blander than the final product, but I hope I salvaged it somewhat by having a limited rotating perspective.**

 **I also realized that I basically never mentioned Blake in this chapter. I just want to assure you that this doesn't stem from my dislike of her, as I try to not let my bias affect the story, but she didn't really have much to contribute. If I felt that she had something good to contribute, I'd include her in a heartbeat, but this situation didn't call for it I feel.**

 **Obligatory apology for the low quality of the chapter.**

* * *

 **I'm not going to rant about anything else this week, but I will say a few points about Volume 4 so far (without giving away any significant spoilers).**

 **The new animation is amazing, especially for expressions. Team RNJR seems to have a better dynamic than either RWBY or JNPR, though it's too early to tell. The new characters are generally pretty interesting. Wasn't a fan of the battle scene. RWBY has become a show with a lot of emotions. Either way, the new episodes surprised me in more ways than one. They were pretty good.**


	8. Chapter 8

Ed held the crystal up to the light as if he were admiring the way that the light of the moon deflected off its surface. If he had an artist's soul, he would have taken some time to admire its beauty and compare it to the shine of a gem. His alchemist's mind crushed that thought before it could even form and he pushed a part of his aura into the crystal.

Instantly, the crystal seemed to explode outwards, forming a series of lengthy spikes that originated from his hand.

He watched for a few seconds and shivered as the cold of the newly formed ice threatened to burn his hand, but he waited a few more seconds before flaring his aura again. This time, the spikes of ice seemed to quickly retreat back into his hand, assuming its original crystal structure again.

He held the dust crystal up to the light of the moon again. After a moment of consideration he nodded to himself, confirming his theory. Three seconds, around twenty percent retrieval. He was a bit disappointed by the inefficiency of it all, but he still felt satisfied by the fact that he had been able to make a much more solid conclusion on how his semblance worked.

He pocketed the dust crystal and brought out his scroll in the same motion, opening it up to check the time.

One in the morning. He sighed as he started to walk to his room, submitting to his fate of having less than five hours of sleep. He already had a few strikes with Dr. Oobleck, and was not looking forward to the berating that he would no doubt receive for falling asleep in class.

Seeing no point in wasting time, he sped up a bit, eager to reach his bed and fall asleep. The floor of the library was often enough for him, but after spending a few days sleeping there he was starting to miss the comfort of a real mattress.

When he turned the corner into the hallway that hosted the first year dorm rooms, he was surprised to see that Ruby was just entering her own room and that Jaune was sitting outside his own door.

"Hey, Jaune," Ed said as he held up a hand in greeting. Jaune seemed to jump at the sound, but he calmed down as he recognized the voice's owner.

"Hey, Ed," Jaune replied weakly. Satisfied with the short exchange, Ed was about to continue past his half-leader, but Jaune continued to speak. "Hey, Ed?" he repeated, this time in the form of a question. "When you find yourself in trouble, what do you do?"

"I solve the problem," Ed answered without hesitation.

Jaune just gave him a blank look and opened his mouth to speak, but closed it before any words could come out.

"You got a problem with that?"

Jaune shook his head and gave him a small smile. "I was going to ask you about what you would do if the problem was too big, but you'd probably say the same thing, huh?"

Ed gave him a shrug.

"You and Ruby, both," he said as he looked down at the floor and shook his head with the smile still on his face. "You're both younger than me, but you're so sure of yourselves."

"Age has nothing to do with it," Ed said as he started to walk off. "Get some sleep, Jaune."

"I just have to do something first, but don't worry. I'll try to get to sleep soon. Gotta have some energy for the Forever Fall trip tomorrow, and I don't think I'll be able to catch any sleep on the bullhead."

"Good night, Jaune."

With a wave over his shoulder, Ed continued to walk to his own room, grateful that Jaune had reminded him of the trip.

* * *

"I really should have believed you guys," Ed said as he looked down at his shoes. They were clean now, alchemy made sure of that, but the memory of vomit still made him cringe. "I thought you were just exaggerating."

"Yeah, we should have pulled you away a bit more forcefully," Pyrrha said with a small wince of a smile.

"Yang still calls him Vomit Boy sometimes, you know," Nora cut in. "She does do that for a reason."

"I guess," he said, still trying to shake the memory from his mind. "I guess I assumed the leader of a team wouldn't be too likely to do that. I should've trusted you guys more, you do know him much better than I do."

"We've only known him for three days longer than you have," Ren said, though he didn't turn to face him. He seemed more focused on looking for an adequate tree to draw sap from.

"Well, you guys hang out with him more," Ed said, unwilling to recall his claim. "I spend a lot of my time in the library, so I don't get to see him very often."

"That also applies to the rest of us, Ed," Pyrrha said.

Ed took a small moment to realize that Jaune wasn't with the rest of his team. "Where is he, anyway?" he asked, bringing the leader's absence to the group's attention.

"Probably off with team CRDL," Pyrrha said with a slight tinge of frustration in her voice. "He seems to be best friends with Cardin as of late."

Ed ran through the list of students that he cared to remember, but didn't remember the name. "Who's that?" he asked.

"Big guy, mean spirited, tried to bully Velvet in the cafeteria a few days ago until I threatened to break his legs?" Nora asked.

The description matched a person soon enough, and Ed scowled. "Oh, him." Of all the people that Jaune could be buddy-buddy with, it had to be him. "Why, Cardin?"

Pyrrha just sighed. "I don't know," she admitted bitterly. "But I'm sure that if he's spending most of his free time with him instead of his team, he must have a good reason."

Ed looked around at the rest of his teammates, hoping for a clearer answer, but Ren and Nora only offered shrugs. Realizing that nobody had anything else to say about the topic, he turned to the nearest tree and clapped his hands against each other, and then to the side of the tree.

"Is that a fully functional sap faucet?" Ren asked, his attention drawn by the familiar blue sparks of Ed's alchemy.

"Yeah, I figured it'd be easier to gather sap like this."

Ren nodded. "I know you might not be allowed to tell us, but would you care to tell me a bit more about your power?"

"That came out of nowhere," Ed said with an eyebrow raised. "What brought this on?"

"It's been a few weeks and your power's still mystery to me," Ren said, shrugging. "I don't consider myself to be a knowledge seeker, but it's rare that I find something so foreign."

"I guess I can sympathize. Well, go ahead. Ask away."

"What are the rules of your power?"

Ed couldn't help but laugh at the complete lack of hesitation. "Looks like you've been thinking about this for a while, huh? Well, there's a lot of specific rules, but the most important one is the law of equivalent exchange. It basically means that whenever I use alchemy, I can't create something out of nothing. For example, if you look at the spout that I made-"

Ed stopped his words when he saw that the spot that he was pointing to was occupied by a familiar ginger haired girl who was currently leaned over backwards underneath the spout, letting the thick sap pour down into her mouth. Without even missing a beat, Ren walked up to the spout, casually turned off the faucet, ignored Nora's indignant pout, and examined the part of the tree that surrounded the unnatural protrusion.

"You're right," he said, with a small hint of surprise in his voice. "It looks like the tree was caved in but there's no sign of physical damage."

"I used some of the wood around the tree to make the mechanisms of the spout," Ed explained. "That's alchemy in a nutshell."

"You're lying."

Ed gave him a quizzical look. "What do you mean?"

"I've seen you use your power, alchemy, a few times since you've come here. I don't remember what you did with Professor Ozpin's mug, but I know you transformed a small piece of paper into a small tree."

"Oh yeah, that," Ed said as he scratched his head in embarrassment. "Sorry, I just forgot that I recently found out how to easily break the rules. If I fuel my alchemy with my aura, I can use that energy to ignore the law of equivalent exchange and essentially create something from nothing."

Ren nodded. "So you can fuel your alchemy with raw energy? What about specific types of energy?"

"What do you mean?"

Before Ren could reply, an loud roar resonated from the northern side of the forest.

"Did you guys hear that?" Ruby asked from across the clearing.

Before anybody could offer an answer, Ed spotted a trio of vaguely familiar figures running towards them. Upon closer inspection, he recognized three members of CRDL running directly at them, but keeping their eyes locked firmly behind them.

"Ursa, Ursa!" Mohawk screamed.

"What?!" Yang yelled back as Mohawk crashed into her. She held him up by the collar and yelled at him again. "Where?!"

"Back there!" he said, pointing back at the direction that he and his other teammates had come running from. "It's got Cardin!"

Before Ed could make the association by himself, he heard the dull thud of glass on earth come from behind him. "Jaune!" Pyrrha said.

Immediately, Ruby took it upon herself to take control of the situation as the only present team leader. "Yang! You and Blake, go get Professor Goodwitch," she commanded as she motioned for Weiss to follow her. The three of them nodded without question and they all headed off to their respective goals.

"You three, go with them!" Pyrrha said to Ed, Ren, and Nora. "There could be more!"

The three of them nodded, accepting her as their temporary leader, and followed the mass of Yang's hair that acted as an easy beacon.

* * *

"I think it was this way!" Russel said nervously. Whether he was unsure about his directions or afraid of what he would find, nobody could tell. Glynda didn't reply verbally, but she did give a grim nod of acknowledgement.

"Ruby!" Yang shouted out suddenly.

"Yang!" came the reply. Turning to the sound of the voice, they saw the trio of red, white, and bronze. Ed heard a few sighs of relief when they saw Ruby waving at them with a smile on her face. Always a good sign.

However, it didn't seem that Glynda was satisfied with an assumption. "Where are the other two?" she barked even as she continued to run toward them.

"Huh?" Ruby said as she momentarily froze in space, caught off guard the aggressive way that the professor demanded answers.

"We found that both Jaune and Cardin had solved the Grimm issue by themselves and we decided to allow them some rest," Pyrrha said, rescuing Ruby from the glare of the blond professor. "They are just a couple of metres behind us."

Glynda's expression softened noticeably, but when she spoke the hard edge to her voice remained. "Go fetch them and come back to the bullheads," she said as she pulled her scroll from her pocket and typed a short message into it. The immediate buzz in each of the students' pockets suggested that she had sent a mass message to all the students in Forever Fall.

"The presence of an Ursa Major is unexpected and troubling. We will have to end the excursion a bit earlier than scheduled. I trust you students will stay as a group until you reach the extraction points?" The way she said it made it sound like more like an order and not a question. Satisfied with the lack of objection, she shot off in a different direction, presumably to find any students who didn't notice the alerts on their scroll.

As soon as she had left, a rustle in the nearby bushes made the students tense up, but once they saw a familiar face emerge, they felt themselves relax. "Woah, guys. What are you doing here?" Jaune asked.

"We just wanted to make sure that you got that scroll message," Pyrrha spoke up before anybody else could. "Professor Goodwitch heard that there was an Ursa Major attack and she wanted us to gather anybody who may not have checked their scrolls and let them know that they should come to the extraction point." She got a few strange looks, but nobody seemed to care enough to contradict her.

"Where's Cardin?" Russel asked anxiously, ignoring or perhaps not having heard Pyrrha's lie.

Jaune's eyes narrowed slightly as he looked at his former bully, but once he saw the desperation in his eyes, he pointed behind him. "He's just back there. Should I go get him?"

Russel ignored his suggestion and darted into the bushes. Jaune sighed internally as he was saved from the awkward fate of retrieving the bully that he had just saved and stood up to.

* * *

"Why's a Grimm being in a Grimm-infested forest a weird thing?" Ed asked Ren, trading their previous positions of questioner and answerer.

"It was unexpected," Ren said simply as he held a branch high enough for him to comfortably be able to walk under it. "The professors at Beacon studied the movement patterns of the Grimm prior to this excursion and the fact that a higher level Grimm was somewhere where it wasn't supposed to be means that something must have made it come here."

"And Ursa Majors are more dangerous than the average Grimm," Ed stated, remembering the fact from Professor Port's lectures and from his own studies on the world of Remnant.

Ren nodded. "It's dangerous enough for more than half of team CRDL to run off at the mere sight of it," he said as he made a small gesture towards the leader of said team and his mohawked partner who were walking a short distance away from the rest of the group. They seemed to be very interested at looking at their feet, rather than where they were going.

"But Jaune and Cardin were able to kill one, right? It can't be that big of a deal, then."

"It might not be, but we can't know for sure," Ren said with an accompanying shrug. "It might also be the result of something terrible. Ursa don't usually move in packs, but in the case that something forced this one Ursa to our location, then more Grimm may be coming as well."

"So we should be on our toes, since there's the possibility that we might have to fight Grimm at any moment."

Ren nodded.

"So then why is everybody being so casual about this?" Ed raised a hand towards the rest of the group. Ruby was skipping around her partner, talking about something that he couldn't discern but he assumed that it was something that Weiss found annoying, judging from her clenched fists and gritted teeth. Or perhaps it was Yang's arm that was annoying her. Its weight on her shoulder was sure to cause some annoyance in walking. Blake had no interest in helping either side, with a book in her hand and her eyes locked into it, denying the rest of the world of her attention. It was a wonder that she wasn't bumping into any trees or low hanging branches.

Close behind them, Nora was trying to sneak sap from her jar, dipping a finger in the sweet sap and licking it off her finger whenever Jaune blinked. Whenever he caught and berated her, Pyrrha would giggle happily.

And walking a few steps back were Cardin and Mohawk. Even if Ed could acknowledge that they were the least distracted members in the group, they still kept most of their focus on the ground.

"We've been trained to exterminate Grimm for a long time," Ren offered. "It's been a while since I've had an actual fear of death when I faced off against one. Of course, I try not to underestimate them but its almost become a casual event for me, and I'm assuming that most of us feel the same way."

"That's stupid," Ed scoffed. "I mean what if a Grimm was following us this whole time and was waiting to ambush us when we let our guard down? No matter how good you are, a surprise attack is a surprise attack."

"I'd say you're tempting fate by making such bold statements," Ren said with a smirk. "I wouldn't be surprised if you got picked up by a Nevermore right now."

They both stood still for a moment but when nothing happened, they both let out a small chuckle.

"Honestly, it would have been really funny if it did happen. If anything, it would mean that my luck is terrible no matter where I go. It would be nice to know that some things never change."

Ed heard a soft rustling in the bushes directly behind him, accompanied by a small growl.

 _Why can't I be wrong for once_ , Ed thought to himself, even as his brain struggled to register the threat directly behind him.

Ed was no stranger to near death situations, and the familiar feeling took over him. It wasn't the most dangerous situation he had been in, but it had been a while since he had been so caught off guard. He was basically staring down the Beowolf's throat as it lunged towards him.

He was no stranger to having to adapt to fights either, but even he needed some time to absorb information from his surroundings to be able to transmute something that could work in his advantage. At that point in his life, he had become pretty good at it. He was quite possibly the best and most experienced person at analyzing everything in his surroundings and instantly imagining what he could create, save for his master. But when the only thing that you can see is teeth and flesh, there's only so much he could think about other than, "I hope this doesn't hurt too much."

He held his right arm out to shield himself from the bite, a subconscious habit that he developed from having a disposable limb, but he acknowledged almost instantly that letting the Beowolf bite him would be a bad idea. Instead, he opted to convert his arm's blocking motion to try and push the creature away.

He didn't expect it to work. He expected the heavy creature to bite into him, or claw him. He expected that his Aura would be enough to shield him from mortal wounds long enough to get him on a bullhead and transport him to Beacon's medical facilities, though he didn't dare hope lest he taunt fate again.

What he didn't expect was for his hand to pass through the body of the Beowolf. Ed felt like time itself had paused but after hearing the shocked cries of the students around him, he realized that it was just him and the Beowolf that were frozen in place. He managed to pull himself out of his temporary shock and analyze the situation at hand. The Beowolf simply stayed still, either unwilling or unable to move its body.

Giving an experimental tug, he felt like he was dipping his arm into a pool of tar. It wasn't solid by any means, but it did provide some resistance. Giving a stronger tug this time, he discovered that pulling his hand out was more difficult of a task than he had bargained for.

"Mind giving me a hand?" He asked the question almost nonchalantly, despite the nearly morbid situation that might have occurred. Ren only stared at him with a disbelieving look that reflected his thoughts on the question or the situation itself. He could only nod dumbly as stepped toward Ed gingerly, not fully trusting the Beowolf to stay still.

With the strength of two, Ed managed to slowly pull out his hand. Ren had almost let go when the Beowolf seemed to shift in its posture, but looking down, Ed saw that as he pulled his hand further out, the Beowolf's legs started to disappear in a thin cloud of black smoke. When Ren regained his nerves, the two managed to combine their power and Ed pulled his hand free from what was left of the Beowolf.

"What was that?!" Yang shouted, forcing everyone else out of their state of shock.

"It doesn't matter, we can think about that later," Ruby said immediately, assuming her natural role as the leader once again. "We know that there are Beowolves in Forever Fall now and there might be more. We need to hurry to the extraction point."

Nobody offered any argument and simply followed her lead without any complaint.

Ed followed the group, but not before noticing that he now held a strange crystal in his hand. It looked similar to the dust crystals that he had taken from Beacon's armoury, but he had never seen one with such a colour.

Noticing that he was in danger of being left behind, he dropped the crystal into his pocket and sprinted to catch up to the rest of the group.

* * *

"I've never seen anybody inhale food like that, and I've seen Ruby with a plate of cookies," Yang mused as she marveled at the sight of Ren flipping pancakes directly into Nora's mouth. She didn't even seem to acknowledge them. They just slid easily into the gaping chasm that was her mouth. Nobody else made any comment, not feeling the need to state the obvious.

"Scallop pasta is ready," Ren shouted without stopping the flurry of his hands. With one hand occupied by its task of creating more pancakes, he took a skillet and laid its contents out onto a nearby plate with a practiced elegance.

"Thank you so much for doing this for us, Ren," Weiss said with a short bow as she walked over to take the dish.

He shrugged in return but didn't turn to look in her direction. "I rarely have the opportunity to cook, so this is good practice for me. It's not everyday that we miss the dinner hours at the cafeteria."

"Even so, I just wanted to say that I'm grateful."

Ren turned to her this time and nodded politely, but quickly turned back to turn off the stove.

"Final batch, Nora," he said as he flipped the last pan of pancakes towards her open mouth.

"Thanks, Renny!" she replied with a thumb up and a grin on her face.

Ren gave her a small smile, casually took away the jars of sap that she had already emptied and placed them gently into the nearby sink. He was about to start washing them, but Ed moved to stop him.

"Let me take care of that," he said as he clapped his hands together and placed them on a jar. Blue sparks flew and when he let go, the remaining contents of the jar had clumped up together and hardened slightly. He gently turned the jar over and caught the clump of jelly in his hand. "Nora, catch," he said as he tossed it towards her.

Even without recognizing what was being thrown at her, she instinctively caught the object in her mouth. After a hesitant chew, her eyes lit up. "Jelly candy!"

"It certainly is a very useful tool, even outside of combat," Ren mused as he inspected the now empty container and confirmed that it was clean.

"Well most people do learn it to make life easier," Ed said as he cleaned up another jar. This time he threw the candy at Ruby who caught it excitedly. "Some people just saw the potential for its use as a weapon."

Ren nodded as he took a bite out of a dry piece of bread that he had taken for himself. "Not an uncommon story. If it has potential to be used as a weapon, people will discover it quite quickly."

Ed nodded as he cleaned up the third jar and tossed its candied contents to Yang's waving hands. "Do you still want to know more about my alchemy?"

"Yes. We were interrupted while I was asking you a question, actually. How does your alchemy react when you use specific forms of energy to power it?"

"You mean something like fire or electricity? Alchemists have tried, but nobody has succeeded. Actually, not many people even know that you could fuel alchemy by adding the energy of a soul, so its not that well explored. Most alchemists just assumed that adding extra power to a transmutation was impossible in the first place, we just tried to increase efficiency to a hundred percent."

"And yet you exceed a hundred percent so easily," Ren said. "And I wasn't suggesting any raw forms of energy, I was talking about dust. You didn't even know about that in your hometown, right?"

Ed froze at the suggestion. He it was true that he hadn't tried to use dust to power his transmutations. In hindsight, he felt stupid for not having tried. He even thought a dust crystal was a philosopher's stone the first time he saw one, so how did he not make the connection?

"You're right," Ed mumbled, mostly to himself. "Do you have any dust on you right now?" he asked, turning to his conversation partner.

Ren pointed to his apron and the school uniform underneath. "I didn't plan for any attacks in the school kitchen," he said bluntly.

Ed gave him a weak laugh. "I guess not, thankfully we don't have to worry about some Grimm erupting from the oven or else we'd be in trouble," he said. "I'll just go ask Weiss if she has some that I could borrow."

He stepped towards the girl, who was seated neatly on a nearby table. She looked a bit out of place as the only one with a chair, but as she was the only one who had requested a dish that required the use of any cutlery, it was quite understandable. She was just finishing her pasta when Ed approached.

"Don't worry about me, I'll bring my dishes over myself," she said.

"Oh, I'm not here about that," Ed replied. "I was actually wondering if you were carrying any dust right now."

Weiss raised an eyebrow as she stood up with her plates. "No I'm not," she admitted. "Why do you ask?"

Ed shrugged. "I just wanted to test a new theory out."

"And it can't wait until tomorrow?" she asked. "The Beacon armoury is closed for today."

"It's nothing urgent," he admitted. "But it's something that will annoy me if I don't test it out right away."

She nodded. "If you're willing to wait until we get back to our rooms, most of our weapons are stocked with dust ammunition. I'm sure that at least one of us will have the type that you want."

Ed sighed, slightly comforted by the news that he wouldn't have to wait overnight, but a bit disappointed that he couldn't test the theory out right away. "Thanks Weiss," he said.

"No problem," she returned and she stepped off to the sinks with her dirty plates in hand.

Ed huffed, expressing his disappointment once again and stuffed his hands into his pockets, only to find that his hand touched something hard. Vaguely remembering that he had left something in there, but not remembering what it was, he grabbed the object and pulled it out of his pocket. When he recognized the object as the black dust crystal that he had drawn out from the Grimm that had killed, he felt his excitement renew itself as he rediscovered the dust crystal that he had forgotten about.

"What is that?" a curious voice asked from behind him. He turned around to see Blake peering over his shoulder.

"It's dust. I found it inside of that Grimm that attacked me in Forever Fall," he replied.

"You found it inside of a Beowolf?" Blake asked incredulously. Only after he heard her repeat his claim, he realized how ridiculous the idea sounded.

"Yeah, I guess," he said, scratching his head in confusion. "Maybe it found it on the ground and ate it?"

"What kind of dust is it?" she asked, ignoring his random suggestion.

"I don't know," he admitted. "It kind of looks similar to gravity dust."

Blake shook her head. "Gravity dust is more of a deep purple, this crystal is a pure black."

Ed shrugged in response. Blake didn't seem to disagree. "Well whatever it is, it's dust," he said, tossing it up in the air and catching it again. "It's all I need for my little experiment."

Ed clapped his hands together and Blake stepped back, wary of his unknown experiment. A short look around told him that most of his teammates had heard the clap and were now watching him with a slight interest.

He took a moment to think about what he should do, or rather what he could do with the transmutation of dust. In the end, he chose to create a statue of a Beowolf in a thinker's pose as a mockery and a tribute to the Grimm that generously provided the dust. He placed one hand on his chest and one on the crystal and he felt the energy from his body seep into the fingers that held the dust. He wondered about the end product for a moment. What would it be made of? If it really was gravity dust, would he create a statue made of pure gravity? How would that even work? He decided to ignore the questions and let the results speak for themselves.

In a flash of intense blue sparks, the black crystal started to glow, emitting a paradoxically dark light for a second, and then it started to dissolve away in Ed's hand.

Below Ed's hand, the familiar clawed hind feet of the Beowolf started to form. He heard a few gasps from the crowd and smirked at the unintentional praises of his skill. He was an expert at making detailed statues and he was proud of it.

The feet extended to long legs until they joined together at the pelvic area. The Beowolf's body grew further, reaching the waist, the torso, and then the shoulders. Ed looked at the material curiously. If this statue was made of gravity, then gravity had a startling likeness to flesh and fur.

Very soon, most of the Beowolf had formed, leaving only a headless monstrosity, curled up in a classical thinker's pose that only looked silly when the animalistic proportions tried to overlap a posture designed for the human body. He heard a few chuckles from around him.

At last the head formed, with a blank look expression that looked almost foreign on the Beowolf's normally snarling face. Ed made a slight adjustment before finishing and twisted the neutral face to an absurd, melancholic frown that elicited a few more laughs from around him.

And in the next second, Ed finished the top of the ears, completing his art piece.

Satisfied with the result, he took his hand off the top of the Beowolf's head and took a step back to admire it, but jumped back in surprise when the statue crumbled over.

"Looks like I judged the positioning all wrong," he said sheepishly to his watching teammates. "A Beowolf's anatomy makes it hard to balance it into a squatting position."

When he turned around to look at them, the looks of horror on their faces instinctively made him look back.

The Beowolf was sprawled out onto the floor like a passed out drunk, not retaining the thinker's pose like a regular statue would. Even so, Ed didn't think that that fact would account for the terrified looks on his friends' faces. Only a second later, he realized that they had probably reacted to the fact that the Beowolf was twitching slightly, even lifting its arm up off the ground a few centimeters before it ran out of strength and let it fall again.

A short raspy noise echoed throughout the room. It sounded like a cough. It happened again and again before Ed fully admitted to himself that the thing on the ground was alive. He backed off warily, fully aware of what the Beowolf could do. He clapped his hands together, ready to retaliate in case it rose up against one of the many weaponless students in the room.

It gave a sharp intake of breath and coughed again as it tried to push itself off of the ground. Its palm slipped and it fell down again, but it managed to position its head in a way that allowed Ed to stare directly into its eyes.

"Father," it said suddenly. Nobody gasped. Their voices were stuck in their throats. "I'm surprised that you brought me back," it said weakly. "I assumed that once you completed your goal, you wouldn't be needing us any more. What brought the change of heart? Got lonely on your throne of nothingness?" Despite the weak voice that came from the creature, it somehow oozed with a thick sense of sarcasm. It was oddly familiar.

"What?" Ed asked, not fully understanding what was happening.

The Beowolf's eyes narrowed and then widened as it truly analyzed Ed for the first time since its creation. "Wait, you're not him," it said. "What the hell are you doing here, Full Metal pipsqueak?"

In that instant, all of Ed's caution was thrown to the wind and was replaced with a familiar and terrible anger.

"I'VE TOLD YOU BEFORE, DON'T CALL ME SHORT!" He yelled as he ran up to the Beowolf and punted it as hard as he could, using his left leg to maximize the damage.

The rest of the students watched in slack-jawed awe as the Beowolf's body sailed across the air with almost a serene grace, until it crashed into the wall with a resounding thud.

"What the hell are you doing here, Envy?!" he demanded. The Beowolf's only response was to groan.

"What's going on?!" The door burst open to reveal Jaune and Pyrrha, both of them in battle ready stances despite their lack of weapons. Nobody even bothered to look at them as they were either too busy with trying to make sense of the situation, or in Ed's case, fuming angrily as he stared at a small black shape slumped over against the wall.

He looked back at Pyrrha, hoping for an explanation, but she only gave him a small shrug.

* * *

 **I didn't realize that I took seven chapters to explain a premise. Almost fourty thousand words. I don't know if I'm impressed or horrified.**

 **Hopefully, this chapter will sate any desires for story progression.**

* * *

 **As per tradition, a short explanation on my thought process for this chapter.**

 **This was actually a really difficult chapter for me to write. I don't know why.** It was shorter than the other chapters too, so I really don't have much of an excuse.

 **I skipped and altered the Velvet scene because I felt that it would make sense for one of the group to stop the bullying, because I had her formally introduce herself to the group and they considered her as a friend instead of just some random student. I also didn't have Ed be the one to confront CRDL because I feel like the others would serve the purpose just fine, and I didn't feel like it was necessary for Ed to be the one doing it.**

 **I was considering letting Cardin make fun of Ed's height, but I didn't want Cardin to be involved in the story at all. His only purpose in canon is to be Jaune's bully and then never be seen again, and I don't really want to change that.**

* * *

 **Also, I'm sure you've noticed but (aside from the obvious presence of unique superpowers) there's a lot of suspension of disbelief that goes into this chapter. How does Ed think paragraphs of text within the span of a millisecond? How does everything happen with perfect timing? How has Ren spoken more lines in this one chapter than he has in the entirety of RWBY canon? But is it weird that I find that the most unbelievable event that occurred in this chapter in my opinion, is the image of Glynda running. Sure, we see her in combat and like other Hunters, she's no slouch athletics wise, but we only see her use short bursts of movement at best. It's kind of weird to imagine her or any other heels-wearing fighters in a full on sprint.**


	9. Chapter 9

**[EDIT] Added proper line breaks**

* * *

 **Changed the rating to T, since I don't know how much swearing constitutes a K+ rating. I think that pointless vulgarity/aggression is a huge part of Envy's character. Of course, I could replace words ( for example, broad instead of bitch) but sometimes it's unnatural and obvious that I would much rather use a swear, and I didn't want to limit myself for such a dumb reason.**

 **Fun fact! After I wrote a vague skeleton of what the chapter should have, I wrote this chapter entirely backwards, as in I wrote the last section first and the first section last, which is why the first few sections are so lazily written. I put all of my effort into writing the last two scenes and I pretty much dedicated the first sections to be connecting scenes to the previous chapter.**

 **I also got pretty lazy and included a lot of short time skips instead of actually writing out some parts. It will probably be very jarring in some places, but I hope that you can bear through it.**

* * *

"What the hell are you doing, you little midget?!"

"You said it, again! Stop calling me short!"

Team RWBY and JNPR watched with their mouths agape as Ed crouched over the body of the Beowolf and proceeded to beat it with his bare hands. That sight itself wasn't too rare of a sight in a Hunter academy, but the auditory accompaniment was something that none of them had ever experienced.

"Gah! Stop hitting me! You're gonna break something!"

"That's. The. Plan." Ed swung his fists to the give more meaning to each word.

Before Envy could reply with another insult or complaint, the door burst open violently, knocking Jaune off his feet. His unintentional movement seemed to trigger the rest of the students to react in their own way. Pyrrha rushed over to see if Jaune was alright, Ruby and Blake started to sprint towards the door to try and get help or their weapons, Weiss frantically reached for her scroll and tried to call for her rocket locker, Yang and Ren both sunk into fighting stances, and Nora tried to inch closer to the watch the fight, but Ren pulled her back easily.

"Students." Glynda spoke in a firm voice that didn't go above the volume of a shout, but demanded the attention of everybody in the room nevertheless. "Please, do not play with your food. You were trusted with access to the kitchens on the account that you would clean up after yourselves."

"Professor Goodwitch-"

"No, Ms. Schnee. You students should understand that you represent Beacon at all times, and your actions also represent Beacon Academy," she said sending a glare at the heiress. She was surprised to find that the girl hadn't turned to her so her glare was wasted. She followed her gaze to the far wall of the kitchen and frowned.

"Mr. Elric. And friend," she added as an afterthought. "Mr. Elric, please keep your anger in check, and you." She gave the Beowolf under Ed a hard look. "Mr. Lattan, I thought I told you that using your semblance to scare the younger students would result in a detention."

The Beowolf gave her a strangely human look of confusion and it turned to Ed. "And who's this bitch?"

Glynda's eye twitch at the sound of the forbidden word. Instinctively, she snapped her riding crop down and activated her semblance to levitate everything that she could touch.

Ed shouted in surprise as the Beowolf's body floated up from underneath him, causing him to slide off and hit his forehead against the ground.

"What the hell is this?!" The Beowolf screamed. Glynda almost dropped him in shock. Her semblance shouldn't have worked on any of the students.

"You're a real Beowolf?" she gasped. Feeling the gaze of the students around her, she quickly regained her composure. "Who's responsible for this?" she demanded.

Nobody responded verbally, but the way that their gazes shifted over to the groaning blonde boy on the floor of the kitchen was a sure indicator of who was to blame.

* * *

"Oh, it's back to this place, isn't it? I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm feeling a little nostalgic." Ed looked around casually at the familiar interrogation room. "But the lighting always annoyed me, do you mind if I turn the lights on?" Ed didn't wait for a reply and clapped his hands twice and gave a satisfied grin as the rest of the room's lights flickered on.

Ironwood looked at the lights and then at Ozpin in annoyance before turning to Ed and giving him a hard look. "I'd appreciate it if you would take this a bit more seriously."

Ed started to glare at him instinctively, but quickly shook his head, "You know what, you're probably right. I'm not trying to fight you and to be honest, that would probably turn out pretty badly for me."

Ozpin opened his mouth as if to deny the claim, but quickly pursed his lips. "You are right, Mr. Elric." he admitted. "We have reason to believe that are you are in collusion with the enemy and it is my job to determine if that possibility is true. That being said, I do not believe that any of ours would be foolish enough to come under suspicion in the first place. Tell me Mr. Elric. would you mind telling me your story? I believe it has been long overdue."

"Enemy? You mean the Grimm?" Ed asked curiously. Ironwood and Ozpin glanced at each other briefly.

"Please answer the question, Mr. Elric. Will you or will you not prove your innocence?" Ed considered pressing Ozpin for more clues on his "enemy," but once he saw the serious look in his eyes, he faltered.

"How much do you want to know?"

"Everything." Ozpin's easy reply would have seemed like a joke if it were any other situation, but Ed could see that he truly meant it.

"It'll take a while, my story isn't a short one," he warned, but when neither Ozpin nor Ironwood made any motion to comment, he continued to speak. "Do you want any details about my world specifically, or do you just want my life's story?"

"Why don't you tell me about yourself first," Ozpin said casually, as if he were interviewing Ed for a job. "We'll iron out the details about your world afterwards if need be."

Ed nodded and took a moment to think about where he could start.

* * *

"You're meaning to tell me that you come from another world," Ironwood pinched at the bridge of his nose, releasing the question that he had been holding back from the start of Ed's story. "Where you tried to revive the dead, fought against an evil government ruled by synthetic humans, fought a being with the power of a god, and used a different god-like being in order to bring back your little brother's body and soul from the dead?"

"You got most of that right, but that last part was a bit off," he said casually, waving a hand from side to side. "I still haven't succeeded in bringing Al back, you know. That's the whole reason why I'm here."

"I have one more question," Ironwood announced. "You said that you were able to bind your little brother's soul to a piece of armor?"

"Yes," Ed confirmed.

Ironwood gave him a hard look and stood from his chair. "Excuse me for a moment," he said as he headed towards the door.

Ozpin stayed silent for a few more moments after Ironwood had let the door close behind him. Ed fidgeted a bit under his gaze, but Ozpin didn't make any indication of speaking.

It took almost a full minute for him to speak. "Is this all the truth, Mr. Elric?"

"It took you that long to think of asking that?" Ed asked incredulously.

"Please answer the question."

Ed stared into Ozpin's eyes and gave him a firm glare. "It's all the truth, not a hint of a lie."

The uncomfortable silence returned, but this time Ed refused to look away from Ozpin. Ozpin stared back into his own eyes, but Ed couldn't determine what the older man was thinking. The poker face that he wore didn't allow for any hint of emotion to peek through.

"I assume that General Ironwood has gone to see whether Professor Goodwitch's interrogation of your Grimm friend has yielded a similar story to yours," Ozpin finally said. "If your stories do not match, then we will know if you are lying."

Ed shrugged in response. "I don't know how useful that will be. Envy's not very cooperative. And even if he does decide to share his story, we were enemies and we didn't meet very often. I also think he's a few hundred years old, so his story might not even be close to done."

Ozpin nodded. "As you've said in your own story."

Ed killed the awkward silence before it returned. "So what now?"

"We wait for your friend to finish his own story. In the meantime, you should get back to your room and get a good night's rest."

Ed raised an eyebrow. "Not gonna throw me into a cell?"

Ozpin shook his head and gave him a small smile. "No matter how suspicious your story, you are still one of my students until you give me a reason to expel you. However, I will request that you stay in your room until your friend finishes his story."

"Do you mind if I borrow a few books from the library, then? I'll die of boredom if I don't have anything to do and I'm guessing that Envy won't be done for a few days."

Ozpin gave him an amused look. "Very well," he said as he pulled out his scroll and tapped away at the screen for a few seconds. "You should have temporary access to the library at this hour. Feel free to take as many books as you want, but make sure to note what books you take and send the head librarian the list through your scroll."

"Thank you, Professor," Ed said as he turned away, taking the familiar route to the elevators.

* * *

As Ed had predicted, Envy took a few days to tell his own story, though he hadn't expected him to take such a short time. As Ed had only been able to tell his story within half a day, he had expected Envy to take at least four days to complete his own story. With a few hundred years of life to cover and with his general uncooperativeness, the fact that Envy had only taken two full days to tell his story was a surprise.

But Ed wasn't one to look a gift horse in the mouth. When he received the message on his scroll, informing him that he was freed of any suspicion and was off of house arrest, he made a small sigh of relief and immediately picked up his borrowed books and brought them back to the library.

When he brought the books back, he received a dirty look from the overprotective librarian who would have normally never allowed any students to bring reference books outside, but was forced to accommodate him due to Ozpin's orders. Ed only shot back a smug grin at him as he plopped the books onto the counter and walked away.

After dropping off his books, the second thing that he did was send out a few messages on his scroll. Ruby and Jaune had both been in frantic contact with him on the behalf of their respective teams. After answering a few of their questions and convincing them he was neither evil or being tortured, they had both forced him to promise to tell them as soon as he was out of house arrest with an eerie synchrony.

Jaune had almost immediately replied, relaying the rest of JNPR's relief along with his own, but Ed didn't receive any message from Ruby. Judging from the fact that Ruby's flow of constant messages had stopped more than a day before, Ed wasn't too surprised by the lack of reply but was suddenly more curious about why Ruby had suddenly lost interest of her phone.

The third thing he did was to go back to his room, which was strange considering that he had been itching to get out for the past few days, but he found that he didn't have much to do otherwise. It was the weekend so there were no classes. Since Ruby hadn't contacted him yet, so he had no idea where the rest of team RWBY was, and team JNPR was down in Vale for the day. He considered going back to the library, but after three days of research, he felt that he needed a short break, which was why he was going back to his room.

He was surprised to see that two unfamiliar figures were standing at his door. He cringed a bit when he saw that they were hugging, and turned around to head out to the library or to the cafeteria, not wanting to have to interrupt their little display of affection to get to his room. Before he could escape, he saw one of the figures turn to his direction.

"Excuse me!" she yelled. "Are you the student who lives in this room?" She started to walk towards him, still keeping her partner in a hug. Upon closer inspection, Ed noticed that the person in her arms was struggling to escape from her grip.

"Yes?" Ed answered uncertainly.

He could see a huge smile form on her face, despite being a few dozen meters away. She started to run towards him. "It is very nice to meet you! General Ironwood has instructed me to take you and your transforming friend on a tour of Vale."

"Transforming friend?" Now that the girl was only a few meters away, he could see that the body in her arms was annoyingly familiar, but it was incredibly satisfying to see the normally smug face so devoid of life. "Having fun there, Envy?" he asked mockingly.

Envy groaned.

"As I have explored Vale on my own for the past few days, I am confident in my abilities as a tour guide," the girl said cheerfully, ignoring the protests of the dying person in her arms. "My name is Penny, it is a pleasure to meet you."

She shifted her body abruptly to give a stiff salute, though the formality of it was somewhat ruined by the happy smile on her face and the fact that her sudden release of Envy had flung him into a nearby wall.

* * *

"Oh, this is so exciting. I have never planned an excursion to the town with two of my friends before! I am shivering in anticipation!" Penny shook her hands up and down furiously. "Look friends!"

"This is stupid," Envy said. For once Ed could somewhat agree with him. "Why am I walking down the streets of some random town, pretending like I'm a nice guy?"

"Just deal with it for now, Envy," Ed said. "We both need to learn a bit more about how this world works if we ever want to be able to get back to Amestris."

Envy sighed. "What's even the point?" he asked in an uncharacteristically defeated tone. "It's the same here or there."

Ed raised an eyebrow at Envy's disinterested mood. "My friends and family are there, Envy," he said. He intended to give his voice a harder edge, but he couldn't bring himself to kick a man who seemed so down. "If we get back, you'd probably get along with them too. There's still that issue with the Xing group that you could help with, or maybe you could live a peaceful life if you wanted. I know you didn't really have that choice available to you, but now that the bearded bastard is dead you can do whatever you want, right?"

The glare that Envy gave him shocked him, but it wasn't because it intimidated him. Rather, Ed swore that he could see hints of humiliation and sadness mixed in with the anger in his eyes.

Envy spit at the ground in front of where Ed stood. "I'm going off alone for a while, pipsqueak. Don't follow me," he growled.

Ed motioned to stop him before he took off, but at that moment Penny caught his arm.

"Look! I am shivering with excitement!" she said as she happily shook Ed's arm up and down. Envy took the opportunity to slip into the nearest alleyway.

Ed sighed, but accepted that he would never be able to catch Envy by that point and even if he did, he probably wouldn't be able to recognize him.

"Penny, please let go of my arm," he said, annoyed. She let go of his arm. "And stop shaking!"

"Oh I am sorry," she said as she immediately froze in place. "I was under the impression that people tend to shiver whenever they are anticipating an event. I have been anticipating this trip for days and I found the action to be appropriate."

Ed gaped at her a bit, but he remembered the general strangeness that was common in this world and brushed it aside. "It's okay Penny," he sighed. "Let's just go."

"Go where?" she asked.

"I don't know, where did you want to go?" he asked in return.

"I wanted to go to Vale, and we have already arrived."

Ed stared at her for a second, trying to find any hint of sarcasm in her voice or expression. "Are you serious?" When he saw Penny nodding with a painfully honest enthusiasm, he felt a headache coming on. "Let's just go walk around then."

Penny gave him a wide grin. "What an excellent idea. Let us not waste any time, friend Pipsqueak!"

In a flash of anger Ed swung a fist at Penny's head, intended to give her a small bruise, but when his fist connected he felt a painful impact on his hand instead.

"Oh no, friend Pipsqueak," Penny said, bringing her hands to her face in an attempt to emulate a gasping motion. "Are you hurt? You really should not swing your arms around like that, you could get hurt!"

"Don't call me pipsqueak!" He shouted as he nursed his injured hand.

His angry glare didn't seem to incite any emotion other than emotion. She tilted her head in confusion. "Is your name not Pipsqueak, Pipsqueak?"

"No!" he shouted. "Why the hell would you think that?!"

She put her hands in front of her face again. "Oh no, I have made a mistake! I had assumed that your friend's way of referring to you was your formal name and not a friendly nickname." She bowed to him in apology. "I am sorry for assuming we were friends."

Ed took his own turn to look at her in confusion. "What are you talking about, Penny? It's fine if you think of me as a friend. Just don't call short."

"Oh are we friends?" she said, immediately discarding the formal bow and grabbing his hands. "That's sensational, friend Pipsqueak!"

"Penny," he said, gritting his teeth. "I told you to not call me short!" He swung at her again, forgetting the pain that had resulted from the last time that he tried.

"I did not call you short! You are taller than me!" she said cheerfully. "I am referring to you by your nickname!"

"Penny, just call me Ed, okay?" he said. "And what the hell are you even made of?"

"Affirmative, friend Ed! And I am mostly made of a metal alloy!" Penny said cheerfully as she gave a small salute.

Ed took a moment to try and process what she had just said. "What?"

"I am the first synthetic human being in Remnant. General Ironwood has instructed me to inform you of my existence. After learning of your abilities, he assumed that your expertise in creating and binding souls would be helpful in developing Remnant's Aura technology."

"What?" he still couldn't believe his years.

"I am the first synthetic-" She stopped her speech abruptly as she seemed to notice something down the street. "Excuse me, Ed. I think that those are my only other friends. If my sources are correct, it is important to interact with all of your friends on a regular basis. May I go speak with them?"

Ed closed his gaping mouth. "If I want to know more abut what General Ironwood wants, should I talk to you or him?"

"I believe that General Ironwood and my father have more information readily available for you," she said, allowing herself to adopt a serious expression. "And I am not certain about what I am authorized to tell you."

Ed nodded and sighed. "That's fine, I get it," he said. "Go play with your other friends." He waved a hand at her as if dismissing her.

She didn't move from her spot and only smiled at him. "What do you want?" he asked.

"General Ironwood has instructed the both of us to 'enjoy each other's company' and I do not wish to disobey him. Will you come with me to meet my other friend?"

Ed gave her an incredulous look before sighing in defeat

"I will assume that was an affirmative sigh," Penny said as she took Ed's hand and dragged him almost off of his feet. Stumbling to regain his footing, he looked up at where Penny was leading him and recognized the familiar trio.

"Now if my sources are correct, they say girls love compliments and gifts. Because I do not have anything on hand, I suppose a compliment will have to do," Penny said, more to herself than to Ed. "I think Weiss's hair looks wonderful as usual, and I will tell her such."

Following the group silently, Ed watched uncomfortably as Penny followed and waited for an opportune moment to insert herself into the conversation.

"I think Weiss's hair looks wonderful today!" she finally said.

"Yaah! Penny! Where did you come from?" Ruby yelped as she heard the unexpected voice. "And Ed?"

Ed scratched his cheek in embarrassment, but didn't say anything.

"Ed, you already knew team RWBY?" Penny asked him. Her eyes lit up with excitement. "Oh that's sensational. My sources say that introducing your old friends to your new boyfriend is an awkward experience, but this eliminates that entirely!"

"Boyfriend?!" Ed, Ruby, Weiss, and Yang screamed simultaneously.

Ed took a few moments to fully realize what had just been said. "Nonono, you're not my girlfriend! She's not my girlfriend, guys," Ed yelled hysterically as he tried to pry his hand from Penny's fingers.

"Am I not your girlfriend Ed?" Penny asked. "But you said it would be okay if I thought of you that way." Penny's voice was more curious than accusing or sad, but the trio in front of her didn't seem to catch her tone.

"Ed, that's a bit mean don't you think?" Ruby said softly.

"Nonono, this is all a misunderstanding!" Ed pleaded.

"Oh I see now!" Penny's eyes lit up in a flash of brilliance. "This must be the awkward situations that my sources informed me of. I must respond appropriately."

"Back off you hussies! He's mine!" Penny shouted as she pulled Ed into her arms and carried him bridal-style.

Ruby, Weiss, and Yang looked on in confusion, Ed started to cry, and Penny's face was as bright as the sun.

* * *

"Hey, kid! You okay up there?! Do you need any help getting down?"

Envy gritted his teeth in annoyance as he looked down at the owner of the voice. Some middle-aged shopkeeper was staring up at him from a nearby alleyway. With one look at his furrowed brow, Envy could see that the shopkeeper thought he was stuck there and would probably be willing to climb up there to "save" him. If he were to stay still, he didn't doubt that the man would try to climb up to his precarious ledge without a second thought in an attempt to save his life.

If he had clenched his teeth any harder, they would have shattered. Envy jumped up from his ledge and onto the roof above him with relative ease. He heard the man muttering something about Hunters and students, but he didn't care. He wanted to get away from those worried eyes.

How dare that man care for him, when he was just a worthless human? Didn't he realize that he would've been hurt if he had tried to climb the steep walls? Maybe he didn't. Maybe he was stupid enough to think that he could do it without risking any injury.

But deep inside, Envy knew the truth. He always did. That man had been willing to risk being hurt in order to help him.

The him from a few hundred years ago would have thought of it as being stupid. He had been so excited and proud to call himself the next step in evolution, but when he was younger he was almost ashamed of his claim when he had first seen humans. He didn't want to admit that such a stupid group of organisms could be directly inferior to him. They were at least a few hundred levels below him. A human and a homunculus were as different as an amoeba and a wolf, there was just no comparison. He couldn't even fathom how such a weak race had even survived for so long.

But they did survive. They survived by banding together, forming families, friends, trusted companions. It was stupid, but over time he was shocked to find that he wanted the only thing that he didn't have.

But he couldn't admit it. Not to himself. He was superior, he was the next step in evolution, he was perfect. There was no way that these humans could be better than him in any way. So he made it his personal mission to expose the evil within humans.

He had reveled in joy when he found out that it was so easy. More than sharing and loving, humans loved to kill each other. Now that was something that he could understand. Everybody wanted to survive, and the best way to ensure that was to make it so that you were always the last man standing.

But even in the darkest times, there were lights that he couldn't snuff out. Eventually, he conceded to the fact that humans had something that he didn't, but it was easy to forget when he watched humans killing each other on a daily basis. And so he did forget. He managed to push his feelings of envy into the back of his mind where they would rot and never surface again.

And then the humans beat him.

Deep inside, Envy wasn't too surprised that the humans had beaten him. He knew that they had killed other homunculi before him. He had accepted his fate to be crushed underneath a hard leather sole and have his body squashed against the cold pavement, but then the Full Metal pipsqueak had to do something that had set fear into Envy's heart for the very first time in his long life.

Envy punched the roof that he was sitting on in a poor attempt to shake off his anger as he remembered. Edward Elric had dug up his jealousy. He had exposed him for the miserable thing that he was, and he had humiliated him. Even worse, he had tried to spare his life and he had brought him back from the dead, into this peaceful world where the only threat against humanity was a literal force of evil, with healthy generations of heroes born and raised every year who would be more than willing to sacrifice their lives for the greater good.

Envy sighed his head, letting his aggression dissipate slowly from his body. Defeat was an entirely common thing for him within his recent history, but this hurt much more. Edward Elric had defeated him by reminding him of the fact that humans had the ability to support each other. This time, an entire world mocked him with its existence, with every piece of human hatred devoted to destroying the embodiment of said hatred. It was a symbolic middle finger to him.

He hopped off the rooftop and onto the street below. He startled a few passerbys, but nobody seemed to give him any real attention. He walked, trying not to acknowledge his own feelings, and trying not to remember the brat that had forced him to be this way.

A few moments later, he found himself by a small secluded café. He almost considered to stop and eat but he quickly shook the idea from his head. He didn't have any money. Of course, he didn't really care if the owner of the café tried to call the police on him once he figured out, but he was more afraid of the possibility of the owner letting him go freely. He didn't want the generosity of a human on his consciousness.

"Finally, she speaks!" He heard the loud voice coming from the balcony of the café he had just turned away from. Envy had the distinct impression that he probably wouldn't like the owner of the voice. "Nearly two days and you gave me nothing but small talk and weird looks! ... Yeah like that."

"Sun, are you familiar with the White Fang?" he heard a female voice ask. He turned around to just barely see a girl sitting near the edge of the balcony with her back turned away from him. It took him a second to recognize the girl as one of the students he had seen when the Full Metal pipsqueak had brought him into this world. He hastily changed his appearance slightly and started to walk away, not wanting to be seen in his most comfortable appearance.

"Of course! I don't think there's a Faunus on the planet who hasn't heard of them. Stupid, holier-than-thou creeps that use force to get whatever they want. Bunch of freaks, if you ask me!" Envy stopped dead in his tracks.

"I was once a member of the White Fang."

Envy heard a strange choking sound, but he barely noticed it. His heart was beating too hard. Holier-than-thou creeps? Forcefully taking what they wanted? The familiar words set a fire in his chest.

"Back then, things were different. The White Fang was meant to be a symbol of peace and unity between Humans and the Faunus. Of course, the world isn't that simple. Despite being promised equality, the Faunus were subject to discrimination and hate. The White Fang rose up as the voice of our people. I was with them at every rally, every boycott. I actually thought we were making a difference, but we were just a group of ignorant optimists. Then five years ago, our leader stepped down and a new one took his place. A new leader with a new way of thinking."

Envy didn't dare to hope. He had heard the story so many times before. Hell, he had created this sort of story so many times before, but there was always the cruel possibility of a surprise plot twist.

"Suddenly, our peaceful protests were being replaced with organized attacks. We were setting fire to shops that refused to serve us, hijacking cargo from companies that used Faunus labor. And the worst part was, it was working. We were being treated like equals. But not out of respect... out of fear."

Envy couldn't keep the maniacal grin off his face. He was right! Humans really were the worst, no matter what world you went to.

With a small gesture, he transformed himself to match the appearance of a random Faunus that he had passed by in the streets a few minutes prior and sat against the wall, eager to hear the rest of the story.

* * *

 **I can't believe I haven't bullied Ed until now. It's so much fun. I almost can't believe that I chose Penny to be the one bullying him, but after reading a bit of FMA again, Ed's weakest against people who can't understand his sarcasm or his genuine hatred for being called short. Usually it's kids, but in this case it's socially awkward robots!**

* * *

 **A small part of this chapter relies on my little assumption about Glynda's semblance being true. Specifically, my theory is that Glynda can't use her semblance on anything that is affected by Aura, which is why she can't just grab Roman and Cinder out of their bullhead in episode one, despite showing an absurd amount of pinpoint control in other instances. She never uses her semblance on any living thing other than Grimm or the Atlesian robots, so I think it makes some sort of sense.**

 **Glynda does use her semblance on Ed earlier in this fic, but that was when he didn't have his Aura unlocked and she assumed that he was completely depleted of Aura.**

* * *

 **Probably my lowest quality chapter yet, writing wise. I blame the reverse writing.**

 **I know I've been apologizing for bad writing in every chapter that I've written so far, but I really do feel like I've committed the most writing sins in this chapter by far. Honestly, I just got lazy. I really didn't want to write stuff like Glynda transporting Ed and Envy to the dungeons, Ironwood and Ozpin listening to Ed's story, and the bullhead ride from Beacon to Vale. Glynda transporting Ed and Envy could have had potential for writing, but I just wanted to get it over with as soon as possible so I just skipped it entirely. Skipping Ed's story retelling was justified imo, since it would be much easier to just copy and paste the FMA wikipedia article. I'll also admit that the reason why I had Envy's story telling take so long was not because he had more to say. It's because I had already written that Ed and Envy first arrive in Vale at the point where Blake was talking to Sun in canon, that takes at least a few days after Blake runs away from the rest of team RWY. I'll also admit that the bullhead ride from Beacon to Vale could have been really interesting to see the triple interactions between Ed, Envy, and Penny, but I was just lazy.**

* * *

 **I briefly mentioned a "Mr. Lattan" in this chapter that goes largely unexplained. It's an OC of mine that will never appear in the story (no OCs in general) but I included because I thought it made sense that Glynda would assume a semblance suited for pranks to be more likely than an actual talking Beowolf. A semblance that lets you disguise yourself shouldn't be that unrealistic for the RWBY universe, right?**

 **I will also shamelessly explain my OC, because I'm really proud of his origins and name. He's based on a character from an Italian fairy tale called Maestro Lattantio, who is a magician who can disguise and transform himself. Therefore, my character has similar powers and his name is Teal Lattan.**

 **Lattantio. Lattan-Teal? Eh?**

 **I'll see myself out.**


	10. Chapter 10

**Disclaimer. I know I'm pretty bad with the excessive use of jumpcuts and timeskips, but this chapter starts with an obscenely obnoxious jumpcut, skipping almost the entire second half of what happens in "Black and White."**

 **Sorry, but I really didn't want to write something that you could just watch on the show itself. I'm sure Ed would've done something, but his presence probably wouldn't have made too big of a difference. Along with Penny, he acts as the deus ex machina that saves the day with his crazy ability to destroy the bullheads at will.**

 **And such, I will skip ahead to my parts of the story, even though the thought of it makes me want to push a pencil into my eye. I just hope you readers don't have any pencils around when you read this either.**

* * *

"Now what the hell was that all about?" Roman muttered under his breath. He looked up curiously when he heard a slight shuffling sound a few feet in front of him. One of Junior's men had just fixed his posture as Roman approached, straightening his back to an uncomfortable degree as Roman drew closer to him.

Roman chuckled a bit, his sour mood lifting a little. It was nice to be reminded that he could still intimidate at least one man. Of course, it was a sad bar to hold when he was proud of scaring the scrawny looking man, but after a day like the one that he just had, the simple gesture was able to brighten his mood by a little bit.

He stopped a few feet away from the hired grunt and just stared at him. He almost laughed out loud when the grunt's eyes locked with his own. They were a bit fearful, but they were calm enough to imply that the grunt thought he was being inconspicuous. Roman could tell that the grunt had forgotten that his red-tinted sunglasses didn't cover the sides of his face or else the grunt wouldn't have stared at him so obviously.

Roman stood up and tapped at the bridge of his own nose and almost lost his composure when the grunt's eyes widened with fear and quickly turned away from Roman.

Roman's grin widened like the smile of a Cheshire cat. He stepped up towards the grunt and patted him on the chest as he walked past him. "You're a good man, Joe," he said pulling out a random name from thin air.

He chuckled to himself as he heard a big sigh of relief behind him a few seconds later. No doubt, the thug had thought he was too far away to hear, but of course he was too dumb to realise that the sound would travel so far in the empty air. Still, Roman much preferred a dumb human's company to a dumb animal's.

Walking a bit further down the rows of identical storage buildings, he counted down to zero, turned to the left, and knocked twice on the wall of the building. After a few seconds, he heard a dull mechanical sounds as the door of the building slowly rose up.

He watched as the door rose and sighed, tapping his foot in impatience. Out of all of his safe houses, this was probably his least favourite. The walk was long and the door was frustratingly slow. The minor inconveniences that surrounded this place annoyed him, which was why he had chosen to give this location away to Cinder and the White Fang. They were almost doing him a favour by giving him a reason to eventually abandon the place.

Finally, the door opened and Roman stepped inside. "Keep it open," he said as he heard the mechanical sound come from the door again.

He walked over to the nearby desk and set down a case that he had been holding in his hand. If anyone opened it up, they would see that it was filled to the brim with dust. Of course, if anyone knew Roman Torchwick well enough, they would assume that the more important contents would be hidden underneath that dust. It might have been filled with Lien, or maybe there would be a scroll with valuable information about the next heist target.

Roman grinned to himself as he thought of the surprised expression that would appear on Neo's face if he were to reveal to her that he had taken the time to transport a case full of dust with his own hands. She wouldn't have believed him and she would check the case of course, but she would find nothing but dust. Low quality dust, in fact. She would look up to Roman with a confused expression and Roman would look down at her with a mocking grin.

But Roman hadn't brought a case full of worthless dust to the safe house to play an imaginary scenario in his head. He just needed an excuse to be where he could easily be found. It was a poor excuse that Cinder would probably see through, but he shuddered at the thought of what she would do to track him down after his… unfortunate accident.

"How very disappointing, Roman." A sultry voice rung out from behind him. He rolled his eyes to himself before turning around and donning a surprised expression.

"Woah!" he yelled. "Wasn't expecting to see you guys so soon," he lied.

"And we were expecting more from you," Cinder shot back. Roman noted in relief that she was still smiling at him. It wasn't a nice smile, but it was good to know that Cinder wasn't in a terrible mood.

"Hey!" he said, with a casual laugh to accompany it. "You were the ones to suggest working with those stupid mutts from the White Fang."

"And you will continue to do so," she replied, letting a flame grow in her hand with a casual carelessness that came as easily as Roman's laugh. "We have big plans for you, Roman. All we ask is a little cooperation."

Roman gave a casual smile and gave her a deep and mocking bow. "And I am happy to give you my cooperation," he lied. "It would just be nice if I could choose my own men for this mission. I can't believe I'm saying this, but somehow the goons that I hired from Junior are much more competent than those filthy mongrels that you loaned to me. I can't even believe that the White Fang can be taken seriously."

Cinder ignored his mocking tone and shook her head. "We need the White Fang, Roman. No matter how useless they may be."

"Sure, sure," he said waving his hands dismissively. "But why do I have to be the ones to keep them on a leash?"

"Roman, Roman, Roman. How many times do I have to tell you?" Cinder said as she walked closer towards Roman. He knew what was coming, but he didn't back away. "You'll get the answer to all your questions when the time is right." She extinguished the flame in her hand and reached up to place her palm gently against Roman's face. Roman couldn't help but wince as he felt the heat emanating from her hands. Looking at Cinder's face, it seemed like his reaction had pleased her.

"Now, Roman. What's this I hear about you being defeated by a couple of teenagers? I never thought that the best thief in Vale wouldn't have any trouble with a few Hunters-in-training."

"That's what I'm saying!" he exclaimed before remembering the uncomfortably warm sensation on his face. "I'm serious when I say that the White Fang are only bringing me down. They're just a bunch of untrained mutts who can't remember orders for more than ten seconds. If any of them were competent enough to actually use those tiny brains of theirs, we wouldn't even have had to deal with those brats in the first place."

Cinder's smile didn't falter. "Just hold on for a bit longer, will you? I'm sure that someone with your expertise can work around this small problem." She let go of Roman's face and a flame reappeared in her hand. Roman gulped as he understood the unspoken "Or else" that Cinder had given him.

"Fine, fine," he said, trying to act as calm as possible, but even he could feel that his act probably looked unconvincing.

Cinder gave a soft laugh and closed her fist, extinguishing the flame within. "Thank you, Roman. I hope you'll stay this agreeable in the future. We'll be seeing you soon."

Roman waited until he couldn't hear the clacking of her high heels before he waited another hundred seconds. When he was convinced that they were truly gone, he let out a breath and drew a cigar from his inner pocket. A second later, he brought his lighter out but let the cigar sit in his mouth for a few seconds before he tried his hand at lighting it.

The first few tries only created sparks with no flame. He was tempted to blame his lighter, but he knew that it was his shaking hands that prevented him from lighting his cigar.

"Doesn't feel too good does it, Roman?" A voice crawled in from outside the door. "I know how you feel. There's somebody bigger than you and you can't do anything but bend to their whims. You must feel so very frustrated."

Roman's eyes narrowed as the goon stepped into the dim light that came from the single bulb that hung overhead. "Oh? Little grunt hopes to empathise with his boss?" Roman asked the questions with an amused tone that didn't match the anger in his eyes.

The goon gave him a wide smile. He was either stupid or crazy. Probably both. "Boss?" he asked, giving a slightly hysterical laugh. "No Roman. I think that both of us are tired of 'bosses.' I was thinking that we could be… friends."

Roman gave the goon a genuine look of confusion. Never in his life had he seen a hired hand get so bold. "Excuse me?" he said uncertainly.

"Come now, Roman," the goon said as he stepped closer. Roman raised an eyebrow as the goon's body sparked with a red energy. At first, he thought that the goon was preparing some sort of attack, but his curiosity grew as the goon's body started to transform. "Why can't we see eye to eye?" the man asked with a casual gesture that looked perfectly right on Roman's face.

"Love the new look, but that's certainly not the most impressive semblance I've ever seen," Roman said. His own face looked back at him with the same persistent grin that the man kept on his face. It was a bit more bearable now that it wasn't a goon that was giving him that look. "Tell me why I shouldn't blow your head of right now."

"I have secrets, Roman." the other Roman said, with a coyness that seemed a bit foreign to the man's face. "Secrets that you would love to know."

Roman raised an eyebrow. In most situations, he would have assumed that the other Roman was trying to blackmail him, but with the strange tone of voice that his clone had used, he wasn't so sure. "And what exactly do you mean by that?" he asked, trying to sound casual and disinterested.

"To be honest, at first I was just going to watch this whole scenario unfold by itself. I'm not really one for standing out, so I was planning to stay in the shadows, mostly watching, sometimes intervening when I saw the potential for fun. But then I saw you dear Roman," he said, his grin even wider to the point where it would have probably hurt if Roman tried to copy it. "You and your little power dynamic between you and your lady friend. Your boss."

Roman scowled and raised his cane. "Get to the point or I'll blow your head off, right here and now."

The other Roman cocked his head. "The way I see it, there's a hidden war going on between two parties. There's the good guys, up in their little towers at Beacon, and there's the bad guys, with their fingers wrapped around the necks of the White Fang. And then there's you." The other Roman pointed at Roman and gave him a smile that made him admire the man's facial flexibility. "A little ant, waiting to be crushed in between them."

A small click sounded in the empty warehouse, followed by a much larger booming sound.

"Egh." Roman cringed as he looked down at his bloodstained suit. "The little bastard didn't even have an aura." The suit was ruined. He would have to burn it and use a different one.

When Roman looked up, he almost jumped back in shock. The sight of dead bodies was nothing new for him, but he had never seen his own body without a head before. Despite being headless, the body twitched as it remained standing, still pointing its finger at Roman's face.

"Well, that was disappointing," Roman said as he brought his lighter out from his pocket once again. In a single, easy flick of his finger, a small and calm flame burst into existence. He brought the flame to his mouth to finally light the cigar in his mouth. If anything, Roman had to thank the wannabe criminal for calming down his nerves.

He was about to turn around to pick up his case and leave, but a flash of red light stopped him in his tracks. His eyes widened as he recognized the tell-tale signs of a suicide bombing and flared his aura to protect himself, but when he looked up, he barely noticed as that the lit cigar fell out of his slack-jawed mouth.

In front of his eyes, his clone was regenerating. He could see the bone and sinew forming from the neck to eventually create the shape of a head. The body didn't move at all, and the familiar grin accompanied the pointing finger once again.

"I'm baaack," the Roman clone said in a sing-song voice.

Roman jumped back and flared his aura around his brain. Nothing changed. He frowned. That meant that at the very least, it wasn't Emerald's semblance. He had learned very quickly how to counter that brat's hallucinations so what he had just seen wasn't her doing. Was the clone an illusionist like Neo?

He shot again. This time, the clone's head twisted in an inhuman fashion, as if its neck were made out of clay, and almost casually dodged the bullet.

"The bullets are a bit strange here," the clone mused, looking back at the damage it had caused on the opposite wall. "I can't argue with the results, but it was slow enough that I could actually see it moving." It shook its head. "Bad show."

"Okay, you've made your point. You're strong," Roman stated, fingering his scroll with one hand. He was confident that he could run away pretty easily even if it turned out that the shapeshifter was stronger than he was, but he still wanted some insurance. "What do you want?"

"Well, I was getting to that part before you killed me, you ass," the shapeshifter said with a hint of annoyance in his voice. "But since I'm a nice guy I'll assume that was a little mistake."

With a flourish of the wrist and a short bow, the red sparks of energy reappeared and slowly, Roman's form and appearance were replaced by a shorter man with long hair and sharp eyes. The only thing that remained the same was the ever-present grin. Unlike the time when he was assuming the goon's or Roman's form, the uncomfortably wide smile seemed to fit the shapeshifter's new appearance perfectly.

"As I said before, you are just an ant, waiting to be crushed. You're an expendable pawn, Roman, and that lady will eventually find that she would be better off sacrificing you than keeping you alive. But I," the shapeshifter bowed deep towards the ground, to the point where his forehead was almost touching his knees. "I'd hate to see such potential go to waste. I want to make you into the third party in this strange war you have in this world, equal in power to both the baddies and the goodies."

Roman scoffed at the outrageous claim. "Okay, kid. How do you suppose you'll do that, and why me? What's in it for you?" Roman pressed the 'send' key of his scroll.

The shapeshifter straightened up and put his hand on his mouth in a display of mock surprise. "Oh goodness me," he said, with a parody of a formal accent. He giggled bit at his own ridiculous accent. "I forgot to introduce myself. Envy the Jealous, here. Professional pawn. At your service."

"Professional pawn?" Roman asked, letting a hint of amusement crawl into his voice. "That doesn't really sell your case too well, kid."

"Oh, but it does!" Envy exclaimed, excitedly. "I'm no ordinary pawn, I'm a professional. I've been a pawn for so many sides I don't even remember them all. A lot of times I was a pawn for two opposing sides at the same time."

"So you're a spy?" Roman asked.

"Not a spy." Envy wagged his finger at him. "A saboteur. I destroy both sides of a conflict so the third unknown side can collect the spoils."

Roman raised an eyebrow at this. It was the first thing that the crazy kid had said that actually spoke to him. He didn't really care too much for good or evil, but he loved a good profit.

"Okay, kid. You got me interested," Roman admitted and lowered his cane. "Give me your thirty second pitch."

Envy smiled. "I knew you would see eye-to-eye with me, Roman. I propose we start things off with a friendship. Nothing solid yet, but we'd still be owing each other small… favours."

Roman grimaced. "You've lost me, kid. You never give out such vague promises. Okay, how about this? Instead of convincing me why we should work together, why don't you convince me about what's stopping me from making sure you never leave this place ever again."

"Aside from the fact that you can't stop me?" Envy asked, genuinely confused. "Didn't you just see me survive after getting my head blown off?"

Roman shrugged. "Parlour tricks. Illusions, smoke and mirrors, magic shows. I've seen better."

"Hmm. It's not really too important if you think that, but is there any way to convince you that I'm the real deal?"

Roman smiled. "Sure there is. Neo?"

Seemingly appearing from nowhere, Roman watched as a blade emerged from Envy's chest, directly over where his heart should be. Envy looked down in surprise and coughed, spattering blood across the floor. The blade slowly disappeared, and Envy fell over, revealing a petite girl behind him.

"Thank you Neo," Roman said. Neo gave him a small smile and curtseyed in reply. "Is he dead?" She nodded.

But a red light flashed and Neo jumped back in surprise. Roman remained where he was and simply watched in interest as Envy stood back up.

"Woah, I'm impressed," Envy said as he gave the short girl a look of respect. "That was the cleanest death I've had in a long time. You didn't even touch anything unnecessary."

Roman looked on as Neo gave Envy a short and uncertain nod. She looked back at him with a questioning gaze, but he ignored it for the moment. "So you can regenerate after certain death," he said simply. "I guess that's one part of your story that we've confirmed."

Envy gave him a hurt look, but his eyes twinkled with an obvious amusement. "Roman, my friend. I'm shocked. How could you not trust me?"

"And why would I trust you?" Roman shot back.

Envy nodded sagely. "Wise man, Roman. Only an idiot would trust someone so suspicious. I'm glad you're so smart. You know what? Let's change the previous terms." Envy held up two fingers. "I'm only going to request two things from you. I want to be able to contact you whenever I want, and I want to be able to give you information and advice. Whether you listen to it or not is up to you."

"And what exactly do you get out of this?"

"I'm going to be honest with you, Roman, and you might not like the answer," Roman tensed a bit at this claim, but didn't let it show. "I love chaos. I know you probably only care about making the most money and experiencing the thrill of doing just that, but I know that like all humans, you love to win. You love to be on the winning side, and I love it when a shadowy dark horse bursts into the fray and destroys the competition." Envy gave him another wide grin. "And you winning would be the craziest outcome that could come about this war."

Roman's eyes narrowed and he was about to raise his cane and shoot his again, but he hesitated. Aside from the fact that he assumed it would be useless to kill him again, Roman recognized that some things that Envy had claimed were not just an opinion or a feeling. He wanted to be on Cinder's side when war broke loose because he knew that they would win, but would she really let him stand alongside her?

He looked up at Envy and sighed. Extending his arm, he started to walk towards him. "We're not friends yet, but I guess I can see where this leads."

Envy smiled and reached for Roman's hand, despite being a couple of meters away. Roman's eyes widened as Envy's arm snaked towards his own. His first instinct was to pull his arm back, but Envy had already caught it in his hands.

"I'm looking forward to it," he said, with the familiar grin plastered onto his face.

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 **Woah! Super short chapter compared to usual! I could've written more for this chapter, but I thought that it felt pretty nice as one continuous segment rather than having a scene change like I usually do.**

 **This chapter came out exactly as I had hoped it to! Envy snark vs Roman snark.**

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 **Woah. Barely any Author's Note this time around. I guess I'll use this empty space to apologize once again for the HUGE timeskip past the battle. I'm not a fan of writing or reading fight scenes and I admit that that fact probably played a part in me deciding to skip it.**

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 **I also wanted to take some time to give my appreciation to everyone who has read, reviewed, followed, favourited, and enjoyed this story. You guys are the best and I never expected for this to get so much love from the community. I try to respond to every positive review whenever possible, but for those unlucky few that I missed and those of you who don't like to review, I just wanted to give a huge shoutout and a huge thanks to all of you. You're all great and you're all the best.**

 **Also, Woah. 70+ Reviews, 180+ Favourites, 280+ Followers, 21,000+ Views?! You guys are insane!**

 **The good kind of insane. Thank you, for reading. Look forward to the next chapter that will be coming whenever I write it!**


	11. Chapter 11

**IF YOU HAVE NOT WATCHED RWBY VOL 4. EPISODE 8, DO NOT READ THIS. Unless you want spoilers obviously. I was going to create an original concept explaining something in this story, but V4E8 comes along and gives me a perfect tool! Roosterteeth membership is free! The paid membership only gets you one day of early access or something. Go watch V4E8.**

 **This chapter might be really messy and it might not be. Haven't really checked over it.**

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The grinding of Edward's teeth made a dull and almost imperceptible sound. In most other situations, someone who knew him casually would assume that he was irritated at the General for no other reason than the fact that the General was taller than him.

If they knew him as a close acquaintance, they would be confused by the fact that his hands were gripping the General's collar. While Edward usually showed a casual disdain for rankings and authority, years of life in the military had given Edward a wary respect for the immense power that the highest ranks of military tended to hold. Someone who knew him on a deeper level would assume that Edward knew the consequences of threatening such a man.

There was nobody in Remnant that knew him well enough to know what it meant whenever his eyes narrowed and darkened like they were at that moment, but as the subject of Edward's glare, the General could guess that he had just made the young boy very angry.

"Please, let me explain myself." The General held up both of his hands in a sign of peace and spoke in the kindest voice he could manage. Edward's eyes narrowed and glowed with a danger that made him want to reach for his weapon, but managed to stay his hand until Edward let go of his collar.

"You know my story," Edward said as he watched the General pat down his shirt, flattening the creases that his hands had made. "You think that I'm gonna try something so stupid for a second time?"

The General gave him a short nod. "I'll be blunt with you, Edward. The world is in danger and I think that with your ability to transfer souls to other bodies, we can make advancements in technology that will ensure the safety of Remnant. I know this is not your world, but even you should care for the safety its citizens."

Edward's eyes narrowed. "That's a dirty move that you have no right to play, General Ironwood." He practically spat the last word out in contempt. "I know how the military works and I've seen a tried and true example of how this particular situation will go. I've seen how strong Penny is and I know what she is. Weren't you the one who ordered her to reveal her true nature to me?"

The General gave him another nod. "I understand Mr. Elric, and in any other situation I would agree with you, but this is a special case." The General paused for a moment but when Ed made no move to interrupt, the General continued. "Under no circumstances would this technology be used by any armed forces as long as I live."

The General stared into Edward's eyes, hoping that his honesty would be conveyed to the young boy. When golden eyes stared back at him, he endured the searching look and simply remained as he were.

"I'm gonna ask you some questions," Edward stated, pointedly ignoring his promise. The General nodded in response. "Who is Penny?"

"Who is Penny?" The General parroted. "She is Penny Polendina, the first synthetic human being to ever exist on Remnant. She was created by a team of mostly Atlesian researchers, led by Daric Polendina."

Edward shook his head. "I wanted to know who she was before her soul was transferred to the machine."

"In that case, I'm afraid that's an impossible question to answer. Her soul is also synthetic."

Edward gave him a look of disbelief and suspicion, but slowly it turned into something that the General couldn't quite read. "Is that so… In that case, could I speak to the team who made her? I have a few more questions for them."

"I suppose that could be arranged, but they are all residing in Atlas at the moment. It will take at least a few days for them to arrive here."

Edward nodded. "That's fine. I just want to be able to talk to them eventually." The General finally identified Edward's expression as hopeful. He didn't quite understand the details himself, but if Penny's soul was truly artificial… he didn't know exactly what that would mean, but if it had anything to do with the binding of a soul in any way that didn't involve alchemy, Edward would probably want to know about it.

"I don't think you would be able to get anything out of me binding a soul. You wouldn't be able to copy the techniques and I'm sure that it would be much easier to rely on whatever your researchers are doing if you really wanted to create more people like Penny. So why even ask?"

The General's eyes hardened and Edward almost reverted to a childlike reaction of looking down at his feet to avoid the piercing gaze, but the experienced soldier's eyes stayed resolute. He stared back instead, hoping to match the General's intense glare with his own.

"What I'm about to tell you will not leave this room." The General spoke with a practiced authority and Edward nodded, though the golden eyes continued to reflect his own as they searched for any hints of deceit. "Does your world have fairy tales?"

Edward remained frozen for a few seconds before speaking. "Excuse me?" he asked as the intensity in his eyes slightly melting away with confusion.

The General only stared back at him, hoping that his serious expression would be enough to convince Edward that his question had not been in jest.

"Well, we're not really big on fairy tales, but yeah they exist."

"Do you have a favourite?"

Edward frowned and crossed his arms. "Just skip all the extra stuff and get to the point, General."

He gave Edward a sheepish smile. "I'm sorry Edward. Admittedly, I don't put as much priority on my teaching as Ozpin does, but I am still the headmaster of a school. Sometimes I find myself putting a bit of extra flair to keep the attention of people who don't happen to be my students and I apologize." In an instant, he erased the smile from his face and reverted to his familiar stoic expression. "Let me ask you a different question. Have you ever heard a myth that turned out to be true? In your world, did you have prophecies or religions that were based around fact?"

"I apologize again, for asking questions that I already know the answer to. I know that you and your brother spent a large part of your lives searching for a legend. I know you have fought against monsters and even what some would consider to be a god. I understand that you have seen how absolute power can destroy families and even entire countries. Please understand that what I am telling you must not leave this room and that when I ask for your help, I do it with a great respect for you."

Edward's eyes narrowed again, but after a few tense seconds he let out a small sigh.

Taking that as the signal to continue, the General spoke up once again. "The world is in danger and we are losing the war to protect it."

"Are you talking about the Grimm?" Edward asked.

"No, this is a war that most of the world is unaware of."

"And what does soul binding have to do with this war? You want to create more super soldiers like Penny and send them off to fight your battles?" Edward's voice rose slightly with a dangerous edge.

"No." The General had expected the accusation and his response was hard and resolute. "The creation of super soldiers was not the intention of our research. Penny's creation was an unexpected side effect of our research. Though my researchers weren't made aware of its intended uses, the primary goal of our study was to gain the ability to transfer a specific woman's soul, or at least half of her soul."

Edward crossed his arms and gave him a tired look. "You know, I'll admit that you've got me pretty interested in that half of a soul thing, but it's getting pretty obvious that you're just being cryptic. Why don't you explain properly or just show me what you're talking about."

The General's eyes widened a bit before he coughed awkwardly into his fist. "I'm sorry about that, Edward. This whole ordeal is surrounded by secrecy. I'm not used to talking about it so explicitly. But you're right," he said as he straightened his posture and walked towards the door. "Let's go back to Beacon. I'll let Ozpin know we're coming. I'll explain the situation in a bit more detail while we fly back, though I can't promise to tell you everything until I know we're not being listened to."

"You don't think your own flagship is safe?" Edward asked.

"I would trust my men with my life. This is more of a precaution to keep any listeners from placing themselves in danger by having this knowledge." The General replied casually as he walked into the hallway. Hearing Edward's uneven footsteps behind him, he continued down the hallway to the bridge of the ship.

* * *

Blake was usually the first to wake up, but she was rarely the first to actually get out of bed. While her previous lifestyle in the White Fang gave her a habit that she didn't feel the need to break, she quite enjoyed the comfort of her bed. Not seeing the sense in starting her morning preparations three hours before they actually had to get to class, she reached over to her side to grab the book that she had delicately placed onto her dresser the night before.

It took half an hour for her to hear anything besides the turning of her pages and the occasional sounds of birds, muted by the thick windows. Not surprisingly, she heard a sound from above her as the occupant of the bed above her lazily moved blankets and shuffled around. Eventually, Blake was able to spot a pair of legs dangling off the side of the bed above her, quickly followed by a body falling onto the floor and a mess of blonde hair that seemed to match the body in volume.

Blake turned her attention to her book as the mass of blonde hair shuffled slowly towards the door to their bathroom, but idly wondered if Yang ever noticed that she wasn't the earliest to wake up. While Blake had no reason to hide that fact, Yang was definitely not a morning person if the zombie-like trance was any indication.

Around another half hour later, Blake neared the end of a good chapter and reached for the bookmark that she had set aside when she started reading. When she patted down the bed around her only to discover that she couldn't find it, she looked up from her book and scanned her bed with her eyes instead. She cursed a bit when she couldn't see anything and got off the bed, grabbing her blanket and lifting it to try and find her bookmark underneath the covers.

The door opened behind her and the soft light from the bathroom spilled into the room, somewhat obstructed by Yang's shadow.

"Morning Blake," Yang said as she turned the lights back off. "Whatcha doin'?"

"Searching for my bookmark," she said, setting her blanket back down and scanning the nearby floor instead.

"Well, good luck with that," Yang said as she walked towards her personal drawers.

Blake eventually found her bookmark on the floor beside the bed and quickly stuck it between the pages of her book. After placing it back onto her dresser, she headed to the now free bathroom, intent on getting her shower before her final two teammates woke up and fought for the rights to use it.

"You know, Blake." Yang spoke up, making Blake pause at the door to the bathroom. "I never really thought about how you keep reading without opening the curtains or turning on a light. I guess you just see fine in the dark, huh?"

Blake turned around to look at Yang, who was currently facing away from her and putting all of her attention to taming her hair. Blake idly acknowledged the fact that Yang had noticed that she woke up earlier than her. "Yeah," she replied.

It took a couple more minutes for Weiss to wake up after she finished her shower. Quickly following her was Ruby, who almost fell off her bunk bed as she woke up, apparently surprised by the sound of her alarm. It only took a few more minutes for Weiss and Ruby to start a short argument about who would shower first, but Weiss quickly won. Like her sister, Ruby didn't seem to be a morning person and wasn't too upset about the idea of having a few more minutes of sleep.

It was eight in the morning by the time that everybody was dressed and ready to go downstairs. Insistent as ever that she be the one to walk through the door first, as the team leader, Ruby cheerfully walked out into the hall.

Yang followed directly behind her, despite Ruby's quick protests that they should walk in a line that would spell out the name RWBY, and Weiss followed Yang, leaving Blake to shut the door as they left.

She wasn't surprised to see that team JNPR was standing outside of their own door, a bit further down into the hallway. Most first year students had nearly identical schedules until their first missions, so the two teams often had breakfast, lunch, and dinner together in the school cafeteria, even when they didn't happen to have synchronized waking times like they had that day.

"Hey guys," Jaune said as he waved towards them.

"Hey Jaune," Ruby replied. "You heading down for breakfast?"

"Yup, wanna join us?"

"Sure."

Blake watched as Ruby skipped towards the other team. It was interesting to see how easily she did it. Of course, she liked team JNPR even if she barely talked to them, but for a girl who was self proclaimed to be awkward and antisocial, Ruby blended in with the other team so easily and so comfortably. It was as if she was a fifth member of their team.

"Well, since most of our team is here for our morning excursion, we might as well bring our ninth member along with us. Don't want him to feel all left out," Yang spoke up, pointing down the hallway to Edward's room.

Blake blinked once before she realized that technically, her thoughts about Ruby's presence in team JNPR were true. Ruby, and by extension the rest of team RWBY, was a part of the same team as team JNPR. While neither team was willing to butcher their names for the same of creating a nine letter acronym, they had formed the first permanently combined team in Beacon history.

And there was the ninth member. Blake didn't know what to think of him. She knew nothing about him and what she did know about him was surrounded by mystery and blatant secrecy. Though he didn't go out of his way to avoid the group, he often spent his free time alone in the library with literal piles of books around him whenever she caught him there.

But then again, that description fit her too. It was through their shared circumstances that Blake was forced to see the issue from his perspective and allow herself to interact with him without judgement. But that didn't change the fact that she still knew nothing about him. A lack of judgement wasn't going to make her instantly like or trust in him. It just prevented the opposite.

In either case, she made no protest when Ruby and Jaune led the rest of the team towards their teammate's room.

She caught that thought and toyed with it for a second, returning to the odd idea that team JNPR was also a part of her team. Should she tell them about her Faunus traits as well? It should have surprised her when she answered that so easily with a yes, but in reality she couldn't see any of team JNPR treating her any differently when she revealed herself as a Faunus. But should she tell them about her past as a White Fang member? That was a question that was a bit more difficult to answer. Eventually, she expected to confess to the entire world about her past, but she wasn't sure if she was ready. But if Weiss Schnee could accept her…

Her thoughts were interrupted when Ruby knocked for a third time. Everybody in the team knew that Edward was a heavy sleeper, so the knocking itself wasn't a big surprise. It was the reply that came from the other side of the door.

"What do you want now?"

The look of shock on Ruby's face told Blake that she hadn't been expecting the irritation that basically oozed from the voice. Blake imagined the look of shock on her own face didn't look anything like Ruby's.

"Who are you and what are you doing in our teammate's room?" Weiss spoke up, quickly brandishing her weapon and stepping between Ruby and the door. Apparently Blake wasn't the only one to notice the fact that the voice sounded nothing like Edward's. Ruby's look of shock quickly turned into one of confusion, then back into the same shock anger that Blake wore. "Come out now, or we will be forced to break down the door."

"Wait what?" The voice inside spoke up, some of the irritation turning into surprise and what seemed to be genuine confusion. "You know the pipsqueak?"

"I'll give you until the count of five." Weiss said harshly, though from the way her muscles relaxed, it seemed that she had judged the voice to not be an enemy.

"Alright, alright, geez. No need to get all pissy about it." Blake stepped back as she saw a hint of anger crawl back into Weiss's expression. Fortunately, before she could say anything in reply, the handle of the door turned slowly. Seeing this, Weiss pinched the bridge of her nose and put her weapon away.

"I swear, you guys need some easier way of contacting me besides banging on the door like that. Wait, who the hell are you? Did they send a bunch of brats to get me? And why so many? Oh wait, I remember some of you. You were standing around with stupid expressions on your face when me and the pipsqueak were fighting."

Blake froze solid as the conflicting messages in her mind threatened to tear her apart. On one hand, the voice had answered to their, or rather Weiss's demands. On the other hand, the Beowolf towered over them with the same angry expression that she had seen many times on every single creature of Grimm. Unfortunately for her, the image of a talking Beowolf was so foreign to her that she had no idea how to respond.

"Umm? Didn't you need me for something?"

Despite her previous vows to refrain from viewing Edward with a judging eye, Blake excused herself from the rule on the grounds that having a Beowolf as a roommate was rather strange at best.

* * *

 **I'm just using this break to remind you all that this chapter will technically contain spoilers of V4E8 of RWBY.**

* * *

"You know, you're not doing a great job of convincing me that you guys aren't trying to be evil?"

"Oh? Why is that the case Mr. Elric?"

"You know. All of this?"

Ozpin raised an eyebrow at that claim. "I'm afraid that you'll have to speak in clearer terms."

"Secret lair underneath an influential building? Classic villain thing to have where I come from."

"Where else do you suppose we keep our secrets?"

"Okay… fine. How about the ominous lighting?"

"There's no sense in using unnecessary energy for lighting when this room is rarely visited by anyone. We only use as little light as needed in order to navigate the area."

Ed gave Professor Ozpin an incredulous stare, but sighed as he looked at the machine in front of him. "I would bring up the fact that you're keeping an unconscious woman down here."

"She is the Fall Maiden that we have told you about."

"Yeah… I figured," Ed sighed. "Any luck on that weird contraption that you have hooked to her? Or the fact that there's another ominous looking pod connected to hers? The fact that it's empty is sending me some big warning signals."

"That… was our original plan before we learned of your abilities."

For the first time since they had met, Ed saw Professor Ozpin grimace slightly as he stared at the pod. "Care to tell me about what that plan was?"

"It is quite unnecessary in light of our newer plans. If I were to guess, I would say that you will be able to garner a much higher chance of success that this machine would be able to."

"And if I didn't appear? What would you have done?"

There was a short pause before Professor Ozpin opened his mouth again.

"This is a piece of Atlas technology that was created for the purpose of capture one person's soul and… transfer it to someone else." General Ironwood spoke up before Professor Ozpin could.

The large room was enveloped in a deadly silence as Ed glared at the two older men with an intensity that mirrored his desire to charge at them and beat them down. It took a few seconds for Ed to realize that he was breathing deeply and it took a few more seconds to calm himself down.

"So let me get this straight," he said. "You wanted to combine two souls together in some sort of mad scientist's experiment, and you're still telling me that you're the good guys."

Ozpin didn't offer any denials. Ironwood nodded and spoke again. "These are desperate times Edward. If it didn't mean the potential end of the world otherwise, I would never dream of sacrificing someone like this."

"And it all comes down to me to prevent that other option, doesn't it?" Ed said, practically spitting his words out.

Neither of the two older men spoke, but Ed hadn't asked the question to hear an answer.

"I'll do it, but if I succeed, I'm personally destroying this machine and all the research involved with it."

"I-"

"It's not a negotiable condition," he said, glaring at Ironwood and daring him to challenge him. "I will never allow that sort of thing to happen again. Not if I can help it."

"I… I understand."

Ed turned away from Ironwood and walked towards the pod where the Fall Maiden laid. "So what's the plan here? Did you want me to try and bind her soul to a robot or some suit of armor like I did with my little brother?"

"Unfortunately, we do not have anything that you could currently use. While the good general has apparently discovered a way to give attach an aura to synthetic life already," Ozpin paused to give Ironwood a short glare. "We were hoping that you could just try and get a better understanding for Amber's aura. Along with your alchemy, your Semblance is quite unique in itself and very useful for the purposes of analyzing different forms of energy."

Ed nodded after Ozpin confirmed his suspicions. Perhaps he also suspected that Ed's Semblance could also interact with whatever energy fueled the Fall Maiden's magic.

"Is it okay if I open the pod for a second?"

"It should be fine as long as you do not move her body too excessively."

Ed nodded in agreement and groped at the side of the glass. Though he couldn't find any sort of latch or mechanism to open the pod, the glass cover opened on its own after Ozpin stepped over to a small machine and pressed a few buttons in succession.

Ed turned his attention to the unconscious woman in the pod, but hesitated for a moment before moving any closer. He didn't have any idea of what he could do at the moment. While Ozpin and Ironwood seemed to have complete faith in his abilities, he wasn't sure that he could say the same. Other than Al, he had no experience in soul binding. Even in Al's case, there was the distinct possibility that he had only been so successful due to the fact that their souls had a special connection from their attempt at human transmutation. Hell, aside from his own soul and the one time when he was forced to use a bit of Envy's Philosopher's Stone, he was very inexperienced in manipulating souls in general.

He didn't have any clue about what he could do to 'gain a better understanding' of the Fall Maiden's Aura when he wasn't so certain about the validity of Ironwood's and Ozpin's claims in the first place. While they seemed to be willing and eager to believe his own stories, there was no conceivable reason to believe in the two men who were still essentially strangers to him.

And admittedly, there was no reason for them to believe his stories either. While he could prove his claims on the existence of Alchemy and Homunculi, the two men didn't have a reason to believe in his claims of anything else. If the two men were desperate enough to sacrifice the lives of others in order to test out a small possibility of success in an experiment where they had no idea what could happen. Did they believe him out of desperation? Was the alternative too cruel to imagine?

Ed's eyes narrowed and he placed a hand onto the Fall Maiden's shoulder. Perhaps that was the reason. Maybe their only options were to believe in his abilities or try an untested experiment on a fellow human being.

He closed his eyes and activated his semblance, trying to feel for any wisps of energy to grab hold of. It was a bit of a surprise when he found himself struggling to move through the thick plumes of energy that surrounded the Fall Maiden's body.

As he stepped away from the pod, he looked up to see that both Ironwood and Ozpin had identical looks of muted anticipation on their faces as him and waited for him to speak.

"The good news is that she seems to be pretty healthy, though you might already know that," Edward said as he brought the stone a bit closer to his face. "For a person who's supposed to be half dead, she has a lot of Aura in her reserves. I could probably make a large Philosopher's Stone with her Aura without even making a dent."

"That can't be true." Ozpin spoke up with a frown. "This machine also monitors her Aura, but she's been in a state of Aura deficiency ever since she was attacked."

Ed gave Ozpin a deadpan look. "Look here, Ozpin. I know what a Philosopher's Stone is. I've only used a Philosopher's Stone once in my life, but I've seen a lot more than I can even remember. I've even made a bunch when I came here, using my Aura and my Semblance."

Ozpin raised an eyebrow. "You say you've made several of these Philosopher's Stones?"

"Yeah." Ed's eyes narrowed a bit. "But I'm the only one who can use it. It only works with Alchemy."

"I wasn't suggesting anything nefarious." Ozpin quickly denied. "I was just curious about how you made them. You say you used your own Aura to create them, but have you ever tried using another person's life energy?"

"Of course not. And that's not going to change."

"Use mine."

Ed blinked twice before staring at Ozpin's outstretched hand. "Were you even listening? I'm not going to use another person's soul to make a Philosopher's Stone, no matter who it is."

"Please, Mr. Elric. I would be more than willing to risk my life for the sake of the world. Besides, I have a slight suspicion that your attempts will prove to be unsuccessful."

"What makes you say that?"

"Call it a hunch." Ozpin gave him a slight smile. It was hard for Ed to believe that just a few minutes before, the man was surrounded by an air of guilt and anxiety. "I've been given a fair amount of clues to solve the puzzle of your existence in this world and I would like to put it to the test."

Ed searched the man's eyes, but when he couldn't find anything but a mysterious sense of confidence, he just sighed. "Don't regret this," he muttered as he took the man's hand in his own.

Closing his eyes, he activated his semblance again. He searched around nervously for any signs of energy, making sure not to take hold of him in case he accidentally took too much and hurt the man. It took a few seconds for him to realize that his concern was unneeded. The man didn't have any traces of an Aura. Looking up at him, he saw that Ozpin was giving him a satisfied smile.

"Is there anything wrong, Mr. Elric?" Ozpin asked.

"You don't have any Aura." Ed replied frankly.

"I assure you that I have one of the largest Aura reserves in the entire school and even without my boasting, I assure you that I have more Aura than the unconscious Fall Maiden."

"Then what the hell have I been using all this time? What's that energy coming from the Fall Maiden?"

Ozpin gave him a curious look, but only offered a suggestion instead of an answer. "Perhaps you should find out."

Ed turned around to look at the girl in the pod. For the first time, he noticed that the display on the small machine beside her listed a few constantly changing values. Blood pressure, heart rate, breathing rate, and Aura levels. He was no expert, but even he knew that a red Aura level was not a good thing.

He walked towards the Fall Maiden without another word and placed his hand on her shoulder once again. This time, when he searched around in the dense forest of Aura, or rather energy, he grabbed onto the first piece of energy he could.

When he opened his eyes, he was no longer in the same room.

He wasn't even in a room anymore. He didn't really have any word to describe it. He where the place started or ended, and the infinite nothingness seemed to swallow him whole. Unperturbed by the familiar scene, he looked around and took in his surroundings. Unlike what he had expected, the Gate of Truth was not behind him.

 _I'll be honest, I'm probably a bit different from what you're used to seeing in your world._

Ed turned around and almost felt his legs give away from underneath him.

 _Edward Elric. It's such a strange name. Or maybe it isn't. Maybe your strangeness is just being shared with you name._

Ed forced himself to stand tall. It wasn't her. It couldn't be her. "Who are you?" he asked through grit teeth.

 _Oh, I didn't introduce myself did I? Hello Edward Elric. My name is Light. I'm one of the gods in this world._

Trisha Elric's face smiled sweetly at him despite his own glare.

"So. You're a god of this world, huh? Kind of like Truth of my world?"

Trisha Elric's head lazily tilted to the side.

 _Maybe._

A few moments of silence passed by before Ed started to pinch the bridge of his nose. "Okay then, how does this work. I've only really been in contact with my own version of Truth. Sorry if I don't really know what to do here."

 _What do you mean?_

When he looked back up, Trisha Elric's form was gone. She was replaced instead by a young man who looked quite similar to him. Perhaps this is what Al would look like if his soul wasn't trapped in a suit of armor.

"You know. I had to give up my left leg when I screwed up trying to bring my mother back to life, and my right arm for when I brought back my little brother."

Al's arms flew to his face as he gasped.

 _How barbaric! What a cruel world that you come from._

Ed raised an eyebrow. "Where I come from, we use the rule of equivalent exchange. You don't do that here?"

Light sighed as Al's hands went to cover his face. When he pulled them away, Winry's face took Al's place.

 _The same rule applies in this world, though not by my design. If I could help it, I would give life to all who reside in this world. Unfortunately, my brother saw to put an end to that plan._

"Uh huh," Ed said, a bit disturbed by the rapid pace that the god's face was changing.

 _But that is not why you're here is it? Speak now, friend. I will give you what you desire if it is within my power._

Ed gave the god a scrutinizing look, but when Winry's face stared back into his eyes he turned away, embarrassed. "Well, I guess you could start by telling me how to make sure that the Fall Maiden's power doesn't go to her attacker."

 _The Fall Maiden? Who is that?_

When Ed turned back, he didn't know whether to be frightened or amused by the fact that his teacher was standing in front of him with the most confused expression he had ever seen on her face. Though he knew that it wasn't her, he couldn't help but think that she would beat him up if he laughed.

"You don't know the Fall Maiden? The girl with the ability to use magic? Controls the elements? The good guys need her power so her attackers can destroy the world with the power of Grimm?"

 _The Grimm?_

His teacher's face scrunched up with intense concentration for a moment before looking back at him.

 _I still do not know who this Fall Maiden is, but if you are talking about the soul that you have entered to talk with me, I am afraid I cannot do anything on my own. I am not willing to sacrifice half of a soul in order to intervene with the human world. I will however, tell you how to return the other half of this soul to it's host. Similarly to how you entered the soul of this host, you must find the person who holds the other half of this soul and help my brother come back. While he's bad at showing it, I'm sure that he feels uncomfortable being separated with me and misses me as much as I miss him._

Light stopped abruptly as his teacher's mouth hung open, interrupted before another word could be spoken. His teacher's face suddenly turned serious.

 _Edward Elric. You have said that you practice the rule of equivalent exchange in your world. Will you do something for me in exchange for this information?_

Ed frowned. There was always a catch. "It's not like I have any choice. What is it?"

 _Please defend this world._

The request startled him. He blinked a few times before regaining his composure. "What?"

 _I know that you are not one of my creations, but I feel a goodness in your heart. You mentioned that your enemies would attempt to destroy the world with the power of the Grimm?_

Ed sighed at the image of Ling begging him with a slight pout in his lip. "Yeah sure, why not. I don't think I could leave this world with a clear conscious anyways if I knew I was leaving it to die. I'll do the best I can."

Ling's face smiled at him.

 _Thank you Edward Elric._

* * *

 **The delay in releasing/writing this chapter wasn't because I rewrote anything to use this new tool, just in case some of you feel the need to insist that I should have released my original concept version. It doesn't exist and it basically uses the same idea. I just would have had to invent a different god. I don't particularly enjoy following canon and mostly do it begrudgingly, but I saw this particular opportunity and enjoyed the side-benefit of further following the canon RWBY universe.**

 **Anyways, sorry for the delay. Exam season is always always killer, and it didn't help that I had a bunch of assignments scattered through the exam season too. I even have an assignment due early January because of a special exemption/extension (probably should be working on that instead of this to be honest…). Either way, been super busy throughout December with the exams and the post-exam celebrations. Writing this on New Years where everything is more or less calm. Except for that stupid assignment…**

 **Anyways, sorry again for the delay and I'll promise again that my delay wasn't due to a rewrite to accommodate the new info from V4E8 of RWBY.**

 **Anyways, about the actual chapter itself, I quite liked the little segment I wrote in Blake's perspective even if it was a bit unnecessary. Though I disliked most of what I wrote out for Ironwood's and Ed's perspectives, I am happy to say that I'm almost done following the canon to a tee. Of course, this doesn't mean that I'm excluding canon elements from the story. It just means that I don't have to strictly follow the storyline from now on. Everything from season 1 had to happen and it did, even if I didn't show it explicitly. The teams are the same, Jaunedice happened, Blake's reveal and the fight with Roman had to happen. The reveal of Amber to Ed was also something that had to happen, but it was also the final thing that had to happen. Maybe.**

 **I do have an endgame for the story and now I have many potential paths I can take to get to that point and there aren't any more story elements that I have to explain or any links I have to create in order for the FMA characters to have a justifiable purpose in this world. That doesn't mean that I'm suddenly driving the canon car off of a high cliff, but it kind of frees me up.**


	12. Chapter 12

**This one was pretty fun to write. Stick around for some updates on my life at the bottom.  
**

 **[EDIT. Changed a "Envy the Jealous" to "Envy Jealous". Apparently I missed it when I was editing.]**

 **[EDIT. Big thank you to FF user: Espada-001 for pointing out a logical flaw in this chapter. Pyrrha uses her Semblance on Jaune despite him presumably wearing his uniform, thus not having any metal on his person. This logical flaw was made because when I imagined the scene, I imagined the entire gang wearing their personal outfits and not their uniforms, so my bad. At this point, any decent writer would make some edit to fix the problem, but I can proudly say that I don't see myself as a decent writer. I'll probably fix the mistake later, but not anytime soon. So for now, please just forgive my mistake.]**

* * *

Ed had been the subject to the glares of intimidating people, but being under Ozpin's stare was a somewhat unnerving experience. He could feel the man searching in his eyes for any hint of the truth and while he was no stranger to people digging through his words, the look in Ozpin's eyes showed a primal sort of hunger for information.

"You say this man called himself Light." It was hard to tell whether Ozpin was trying to ask a question, or whether he was merely repeating his claims.

"Well, I can't really say whether it was a man or a woman, but it did call itself Light."

"Interesting, interesting," he mused without taking his eyes away from Ed's. "Tell me, Mr. Elric. Do you know the tale of the two brothers?"

"Ozpin." Ironwood's voice gave Ed a much needed excuse to look away.

"You're right. It would be bad of me to get distracted. Let's get to the point shall we?" When Ed turned back to Ozpin, he was surprised to see a sombre expression. "Do you think that you will be able to transfer the Fall Maiden's soul to a robotic vessel?"

"No, I don't think I can," he said carefully, still thinking about Ozpin and Ironwood's intentions. "It's dangerous to try it on a full and healthy soul in the first place, so trying it on half of a soul would probably be even worse. Plus, now we have a different way of bringing the Fall Maiden's soul back, don't we?"

Ozpin's sombre expression didn't lift like Ed hoped it would. Instead, the older man's gaze finally broke away from his eyes and started to trail away, looking at something behind him. Ed didn't have to turn around to know what the man was staring at. The only thing behind him was the machinery that the Fall Maiden laid in.

"We had a deal. You said you'd let me destroy the damn thing if I fix your problem."

"That was the deal," Ozpin said, his voice holding no detectable hints of any emotion. "But as you cannot hold your end of the deal, we cannot give up our only alternative of ensuring that our enemy does not gain an immeasurable power."

"And who said that I can't hold my end of the deal?"

Ozpin gave him another searching look. "Didn't you just say that you had no way to ensure that the Fall Maiden's power does not go to her attacker?"

Ed gave Ozpin a grin. "I said that your god couldn't do it, but I'm not your god am I? I'm Edward Elric and judging from my track record, I'd say I'm a bit better."

* * *

"I'm so sorry. Is he gonna be alright?"

During his first twenty years of life, he had always thought that the hardest part about impersonation would be in understanding the small details. He was right in assuming that trying to find out every single detail about a person before transforming into them was difficult, but when he was released into the world for his first mission, he quickly understood what the hardest part about impersonation was. Sometimes, there were situations where he found it incredibly difficult not to break character.

He could barely hold back his laughter as he struggled to keep a genuine look of concern on his face.

"He'll be fine." The white-haired girl's reply was hidden behind a veil of formality, but from the speed of her reply and the slight quivering of her voice he could tell that she was nervous. "Envy, was it?"

White. She remembered his name even when she only heard it once in a strange situation. Good memory. Probably clever. Possibly shy, if her nervousness was any indication of that. "Envy Jealous. It's nice to be able to formally introduce myself." When he extended his claw to the girl, he cursed at his own foolishness for not realizing that he wasn't in his human form. It wasn't a surprise that the girl's voice had quavered slightly.

"It's nice to meet you, Envy Jealous. My name is Weiss Schnee." She backed away from the claw and leaned over slightly in a motion that barely registered as a short bow.

"Oh, so sorry Weiss. I was gonna try and surprise Edward when he got back and it looks like I just forgot to change back before I got to the door." He laughed casually while scratching his cheek in embarrassment. Without moving, he started to transform back into his familiar human form. He extended his hand again, giving a practiced smile. "Please forgive me."

Weiss's eyes widened with surprised, but she seemed to be able to regain her composure quickly. "I suppose that's reasonable." She might be from a high-class family, if the habits of the rich were anything like his own world. The way that she firmly grasped his hand while keeping direct eye contact told him as much. Perhaps she was proud. Most rich humans tended to have an undeserved pride, but it wouldn't be good to act on that assumption until he had more proof.

"Turning into a Beowolf is something you often do as a prank? Gotta say, I like your style." He switched his attention to Yellow. Her muscles were still tense from seeing his other form, and he noticed that she had purposefully moved in front of Red. "Seems like you're pretty close to Ed, huh?"

Envy smiled easily. If she was fishing for information so obviously, he felt the need to refrain from biting out of principle, but it was a good way to make fast friends.

"Yeah, I guess you could say we grew up together. How do you guys know Ed?"

"We're in the same team as him. I'm Ruby and I'm one of his team leaders." Ruby easily pushed past Yellow to stand by Weiss's side and grab their still joined hands. Weiss gave Ruby an annoyed look, but Ruby was staring directly at him and didn't seem to notice. She had very innocent eyes. How fun.

"One of his team leaders?" He asked the question with feigned interest, picking at the phrasing of her claim.

"Oh the other team leader's Jaune." She said, smile not fading. "He's the one that knocked himself unconscious after seeing you."

Weiss hissed and poked Ruby in the side with her free hand, but he pretended not to notice and adopted his concerned expression again. "Oh, I'm so sorry about that." He pulled himself free of Ruby and Weiss's collective grip and walked over to Jaune. Red Circlet watched him with a careful eye as he approached. "Will he be okay?"

He saw Red Circlet's expression soften a bit. "Perhaps we should bring him to the infirmary?" Her soft spoken suggestion was disguised as a question. Unconfident? He knelt down to pick Jaune's limp form and rest him over his shoulder. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her about to call out to him but she hesitated. Not assertive, somewhat timid. That could be useful.

"Please, let me help. It's the least I could do."

* * *

"Ah of course, it must have slipped my mind." Ozpin let some humor slip back into his voice. The atmosphere had been so tense for so long and quite frankly, it was tiring. He couldn't understand how James lived with it.

"Edward," James started, as if on cue. "What makes you think that you can fix this problem of ours?"

Ozpin kept his face impassive, but was rather surprised to see that James was so accepting of Edward's claims. Even though he had questioned him, it was in a curious and almost hopeful manner, rather than a scrutinising one. He would have expected that the hardened General would be a bit more skeptical to the skills of a sixteen year old stranger.

"Even if I can't use alchemy to solve this problem, I can just do what Light told me to."

Though he had the urge to ask Edward for clarification, he trusted that James would the question even if he didn't.

"What do you plan to do?"

If he had decided to ask the question himself, he would have simply asked, "how?" but he did not feel the need to criticize James, internally or otherwise. But if he did have one thing to mention, it would be the general vagueness of the question. Admittedly, it felt a bit odd to judge a question as too vague, especially when he was not the one asking it.

"I'm going to find the enemy and I'm gonna drag the other half of the Fall Maiden's soul out of her."

Despite the direness of the situation, Ozpin couldn't help but feel a bit of amusement.

"I didn't mean that," James said, clearly realizing that indeed, his question had been too vague. "I was asking more about how you were planning to do that. Your plan requires you to find our the Fall Maiden's attacker, Edward, and if we could find her we may not have found it necessary to seek out your help in the first place."

"Yeah, but with me you'll have a better chance at finding her."

It only took a short moment for Ozpin to figure out what Edward was talking about. When he did realize, he played around with the thought, wondering if Edward's ability would be the thing that they needed to find their assassin. Perhaps Edward would be even more valuable than he had originally expected.

"How so?" James asked. Ozpin trusted that his friend had realized what Edward was implying as well, but still wanted him to confirm his suspicions.

"Well, originally I thought that I had the ability to transmute Aura, but I was just assuming that since I never tried to use my Semblance on anyone other than myself." As he said this, Edward seemed to grab at his own chest, but when he opened his hand again, a small red stone sat in his hand. Ozpin smiled. It was always nice to see when some theatrical flair was added to an explanation. "But when I tried to take Ozpin's Aura it didn't work. That means whatever I'm taking is something different. It might be directly tied to Aura, judging from the fact that my Aura levels go down whenever I made a Philosopher's stone or used myself as energy, but it's still something unique that I seem to share with the Fall Maiden, or more specifically, it's unique to the Fall Maiden's power."

James nodded and Ozpin agreed as well, though he didn't nod his head. Excitement was always the hardest emotion to mask, but after many years of practice, he managed not to bounce around like a schoolboy.

Somehow, with some sort of power or technology that they didn't possess, Salem and her minions could find and hunt down the maidens. It was something that he had assumed ever since he had known of Salem's true nature as an ancient being of evil, but acknowledging the disadvantage didn't make it go away. It was infuriating to play such a complicated game when you could only see a quarter of the board while the enemy could see the board and your hand.

Now that they had a magic detector of their own and the game was becoming slightly more even.

* * *

While Envy had promised Pyrrha that he would help her carry Jaune's lifeless body across their shoulders all the way to the infirmary, it took less than three minutes for Jaune to suddenly wake up on the way. When Jaune stirred, Envy braced himself for the inevitable spasms that Jaune would have after waking up from a "Beowolf" attack. He was about to warn Pyrrha, but was curious to see that even though she had obviously felt the stirring as well, she didn't move to make any precautions for it. When Jaune fully woke up and reached for his sword, one that he didn't currently have on his person, Envy casually slipped out from underneath his arms, but Pyrrha remained as she were. Jaune fell and had Pyrrha pinned on the floor before he stopped flailing around.

It wasn't hard to realize that even though Pyrrha may have had the ability to escape, she didn't. Was she trying to break his fall? Perhaps, but judging from her smooth movements and lack of surprise at his flailing, she could have easily caught him, though it might have caused minimal discomfort for Jaune. Perhaps she fancied him? One more point for her profile.

"Woah, is it getting hot in here or is it just me?" He kept the sarcasm out of his voice and replaced with a teasing tone. It was so unfortunate that he had decided to be friendly to the group of kids.

A flood of colour filled the faces of both Jaune and Pyrrha as they seemed to realize the closeness of their bodies. With the combined motion of Jaune jumping up and off of Pyrrha and the force of her pushing his body off her own caused Jaune to fly into the air.

Super strength? No the arc of his launching was a bit unnatural. It was a power, but he couldn't tell what exactly it was. He would have to be careful if he ever wanted to impersonate her. Her personality was easy enough, but he had no clues about her fighting style and he didn't even know if it was possible to emulate what she just did.

"Ah sorry, sorry," he said cheerfully. "You guys were just so cute, I couldn't help but tease you."

Pyrrha's expression turned into one filled with embarrassed horror. "Envy!" she half-whispered, half-shouted.

Well it was unconventional for him to get someone to trust him by teasing them, he rarely dealt with trying to infiltrate the ranks of children.

"Oh, I'm sorry." He said this while donning his own embarrassed expression. "I'm not really accustomed to this country's social norms."

Pyrrha seemed to become embarrassed for a completely different reason. "Oh, I'm sorry, Envy. I didn't mean-"

"I mean, hugging your lover so tightly was always a thing that we did behind closed doors back in my hometown. You cityfolk are much bolder than I thought you'd be." He gave her a quick teasing grin and almost jumped away when he saw her reaction. Even as a shapeshifter, he was almost jealous of her ability to change her skin to match the colour of her hair so instantly.

"That's not- I-" Pyrrha stumbled over her words.

"I'm just teasing," he said, giving her an easy laugh as her mouth opened and closed wordlessly. "But honestly, is it normal to shove your boyfriend into the ceiling in this country? I'm kind of intimidated off of any romance if this is the kind of thing I should expect."

As he watched Pyrrha scream her realization, bring Jaune down, apologize to him, and have her apology accepted, he felt a pang of annoyance at the fact that figuring out her character was so easy. Chances to analyze people on their own were rare and valuable, but when his target's quirks and personality were so easy to observe, he almost felt robbed of a challenge.

By the time that Jaune had convinced Pyrrha that he was fine, a task that took a surprisingly long time, considering Pyrrha's timid nature, Envy had been able to get a better understanding of Jaune's nature. With a few probing questions, he also learned that the group had only met around a month before. A majority of them had been strangers, with the only exceptions being Ruby and Yang, along with Nora and Ren. He would have to be careful if he ever tried to impersonate any of those four.

By the time that they arrived at the cafeteria, Envy had the impression that he had been able to sell himself as a kind and playful young boy to the two children. It was easy to get Jaune to enjoy his company. The boy was almost desperate for attention and approval, and by asking him simple questions and showing appreciation for the answers, Envy had Jaune talking nonstop with a smile on his face. Pyrrha was similarly simple, but even more effortless. Her smile seemed to widen whenever he made Jaune laugh or rant about some pointless topic. He was also convinced that she had enjoyed the fact that he had implied that she and Jaune were in a relationship.

Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted Yang waving to them from across the room. But he was supposed to be focused on Jaune's explanation of the Faunus, so it wouldn't have made sense for him to have noticed. So instead he waited for Pyrrha to notice the waving hand and inform them.

When she did, the trio walked over to the table to say hi, but when Pyrrha and Jaune stepped away to walk towards the serving stations to grab a tray, Envy saw his chance to switch to another target.

"Hey, what's that?" He asked, leaning over the table slightly to point at the cookies on Ruby's plate.

"Hm?" Ruby looked back at him with a confused expression on her face, but didn't offer any verbal reply due to her full mouth.

"That thing," he said, pointing again. "Those round objects with the brown spots. Is that food?"

Ruby gasped with her food still in her mouth, and immediately started to cough. Yang gently pounded at Ruby's back and after a few seconds, pushed Ruby's glass of milk closer towards her. Ruby grabbed for the milk, downed the glass in one go, gave a relieved sigh, and looked up at Envy with absolute horror in her eyes.

"You don't know what a cookie is?!"

"No." He lied. "I assume the round thing is a cookie?"

Ruby's mouth gaped open and she stared at him blankly.

"Hey," he said, turning to Nora. "What's the big deal about cookies?"

"Eh, beats me," she said, shrugging. "They're pretty good, but nothing to go crazy for. Why are you asking me?"

"Well, you're the only other person who has cookies on their plate," he said, pointing to her pancakes. "I just thought you'd know the most about them. Plus, your cookies are bigger than Ruby's so I thought maybe you liked them more."

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Ren's eyes go wide. Nora's eyes narrowed in contrast. "These are cookies?" she asked in a low voice. "Do you not know what a pancake is?"

When Envy shrugged, Nora stood up immediately, reached across the table to grab Ruby, and pulled her out of her seat.

"Ruby! It's our duty to make sure we educate Envy on the importance of a good diet!"

"Bwuh?" Ruby replied dumbly, having just woken from her semi-catatonic state.

"Let's go! Time's wasting away!" Nora exclaimed as she grabbed Envy's arm with her free hand and sprinted towards the other end of the cafeteria.

Though realistically, he hadn't expect to be able to continue the pace of two people at a time, he welcomed the development. He also hoped that his analysis and his impression on Ruby and Nora would be as easy to develop as it was with Jaune and Pyrrha.

* * *

In truth, he wasn't too sure of how highly his ability would be valued. While it was true that with his power, he could easily detect who possessed this special energy and who did not, it only applied to whatever he could grab whenever he was using his Semblance. It was almost surprising to see a nod of approval from both men.

"There are obvious weaknesses of course," he continued. While it was never a good idea to sell your weaknesses, it wasn't a good idea to try to hide them, especially when Ed was convinced that the two men had already mapped out the implications of his ability in their minds. The conversation from that point on was almost a formality. "I can only detect this 'magic' whenever I'm directly interacting with someone, and I won't be able to feel it unless I'm using my Semblance."

"And how often can you use your Semblance?" Ironwood asked.

"If I don't need to focus on anything else or actually use it to manipulate energy, twelve hours straight," he estimated. "But the bigger problem is that I actually need to focus on using it. If I'm studying or talking to people, I won't be able to keep it up."

"No. That won't do, Mr. Elric." Ozpin's words made Ed pause. "You are my student and I expect you to focus in class." It was getting easier to ignore his obvious misdirections.

"Ozpin." Ironwood said with a tinge of irritation hidden in his voice, obviously still not completely immune to Ozpin's quirks.

"No James," Ozpin said, without turning to look at Ironwood. "Your ultimate goal is to revive your little brother, is it not? While I believe that you are not the type of person to sacrifice the well-being of others in order to help yourself, quite frankly there is not much reason for you to be here. You are here as a student because you want to understand this world better during your search for the method to revive your brother, but other than that there is nothing else that we can offer."

A few seconds of silence passed by, before being interrupted by Ironwood's sigh.

"Now Mr. Elric, tell me. Did you have any ideas on how to meet our unidentified attacker?" Ozpin continued as if the last minute of conversation hadn't happened.

"Well honestly, I thought I'd let them come to us." Ed replied easily, taking the unusual flow of the conversation into stride. "You know, keep an ear to the ground. Look for any signs of trouble around Vale and Beacon?"

"And why is that?"

It would have been easy to assume that Ozpin truly didn't know what Ed's suggestion would be, but he knew better. In either case, Ed decided to humor him. "Whoever attacked the Fall Maiden wants the rest of her power. Assuming that they know that your group was the ones who stopped them from taking all of the Fall Maiden's powers in the first place, the first spot they'll search is Beacon. We can't really say when they'll attack, but if they have any sense, they'll have to plan and set up an attack. Chances are, they'll be close to Beacon and I can casually scan any suspicious outsiders that I might notice."

* * *

Pyrrha, Jaune, Ruby, Weiss, Ren, Yang, Blake, Nora. That was the descending order on how confident he was in impersonating each of them accurately. Pyrrha was by far the easiest to understand, while he wasn't sure if he had accurately analysed Nora. While her actions seemed to be random in nature, he never liked to leave things to chance.

In any case, he was getting tired of analysing the children. Quite frankly, none of them were very interesting and he dreaded the idea of spending the rest of the day with them. It hadn't even been half an hour since he had sat down in his seat and already he was getting bored with the simple and utterly pointless chatter of the schoolkids. Some of them even still had food on their plates. The human mind often baffled him, even though he viewed himself as an expert on the subject.

Even Ruby's talk of weapons quickly turned him off once he realized that she desired the showmanship that a good weapon brought, rather than the lethality. Many times he had asked himself whether integrating himself into the student body was necessary, and many times he was forced to convince himself that he could not just go on a murderous rampage against his tormentors.

He had to be in Edward's good graces, along with the Professors'. Though he hated to admit it, they were strong. If they considered him to be an enemy, he didn't doubt that he would be beaten with relative ease. And that would leave him in a strange position.

No. He had to convince everyone that he was on their side. It was only then that he could sneak around for information and manipulate them without attracting attention.

Admittedly, he didn't know whether befriending this group of children was the best way to achieve his goals. He had taken the opportunity when it came knocking at his door, but was it really the best option?

"Alright guys, let's head off to class!" The excited announcement shook him from his thoughts. "After we put away our plates, of course."

He added his own, "sure" to the ensuing responses and stood up with a casual smile on his face.

* * *

"Honestly though, I don't think looking for the assassin will do much good, especially if you guys have no idea what they look like. If anything, we can only wait for them to come to us."

"Since our assassin was able to utilize the Fall Maiden's power, it should be safe to assume that she is female."

"Right. Do you have any other information on her?"

"Sadly, we do not have much. And the man who was able to intercept their attack is currently out of contact. I'm afraid that your suspicions are correct. We may have to wait for their first move."

* * *

Envy couldn't stop the wide grin from spreading across his face in an almost unnatural manner. He quickly wiped the expression off his face, hoping that nobody had noticed, but he couldn't help but feel giddy inside.

What were they doing here? Was this his lucky break? He wasn't one to look a gift horse in the mouth, and he certainly wasn't one to pass up such a golden opportunity, no matter how unexpected it was.

With the tray still in his hand, he walked towards them.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw that Yang had noticed his deviation from the group, but he walked on regardless.

Each person at the table noticed him approaching, yet each of them tried to hide that fact. There was barely any noticeable change to the way they talked with one another, but to a well-trained eye their attempts to look ignorant were completely useless.

But it wouldn't do to reveal that fact to them.

"Umm, excuse me?"

All three heads turned to look at him. A raised eyebrow and a cock of the head told him that they were trying to pretend that he had just caught their attention.

"I couldn't help but notice that you guys were a bit different from the other students."

Some of them tensed their muscles.

"How so?" One of them asked back. The boss.

"You're wearing a different uniform."

The tension in their muscles seemed to relax a bit, though he could see that they hadn't completely calmed down.

"Well, in that case, you aren't wearing a uniform at all." The boss gave a small laugh. "Maybe we should've pointed that out first."

"Ah, you caught me." Envy gave an embarrassed grin and a short shrug. "I was just wondering if you were transfer students here."

"Yes. We come from Haven."

"Oh, that's neat! I'm kind of a transfer student too and I know how nerve-wracking it must be to try and make new friends when everybody else already knows each other. I was pretty lucky to find a large group of friends, but I couldn't help but feel a bit of empathy when I saw you guys sitting alone. Could I introduce you to my friends?"

It was pathetic, but under the guise of a young student, he didn't have much else. In either case, his goal wasn't to get them integrated into this group yet. Just letting him be aware of his existence was good enough for him, though it was almost embarrassing to be forced into using such a juvenile method.

"Hey, man. We appreciate the effort, but-"

"No, no, Mercury. We should accept this chance to make friends." The boss interrupted the grey-haired one as her eyes seemed to wander from his own, and towards the small group of children standing a few feet away.

In his surprise, he almost wasn't able to memorize the way that her eyes moved. Turning around to see the positions of the children behind him, if nobody moved around, she had taken a brief glance at Ruby, Weiss, Blake, Yang, and Pyrrha. That was interesting. She had some sort of interest in them, or she wouldn't have interrupted Mercury's attempt to shoo him away.

He smiled the most genuine smile that he wore on that day, and extended his hand.

"My name's Envy Jealous. What's yours?"

She gave him a light smile and took his hand. "Cinder Fall." It was odd to see such a perfect and fake smile on someone so young.

* * *

 **So, quick update.**

 **I'm going to try and update this story on a weekly basis. Emphasis on try. Due to a lot of things, I now have a very class-free semester and after years of being in a very intensive major, free time is somewhat of a foreign concept to me. With my free time, I'm going to try and write frequently, but no guarantees.  
**

 **Updates will be on Saturday or Sunday, depending on when I feel like uploading the chapter.**

 **If a week passes without me updating, feel free to yell at me. I'm probably just watching Netflix or something.**


	13. Chapter 13

**Stage? Arena? Platform? I think stage is the best choice of word, but I really don't know for sure.**

* * *

When he opened the door to the training arena, Ed was surprised to find that his small group of friends had grown since he had been talking to Ozpin and Ironwood. Not that he was surprised at the fact that they had gotten more friends, as they were a friendly and sociable bunch, but he was specifically surprised at the fact that they were getting along so well with a sociopathic serial killer.

"Hey guys, sorry I'm late," he said as he walked up the stairs to where they were sitting.

"Hey Ed, where were you this morning?" Yang asked, patting at the seat beside her and motioning for him to sit down.

"Oh you know, running around and getting some errands done. Did I miss anything good?"

Yang stared at him for a moment, but shrugged, probably having decided that she didn't care enough to point out his obvious change in subject. "Nah. It's just been the same old thing. Well actually, you did miss a pretty cool fight. I wasn't the one fighting so usually I wouldn't say anything about it, but…" Yang said, trailing off with a grin.

"Pyrrha beat an entire team by herself!" Ruby said, popping out from behind Yang's body.

"You ruined the dramatic reveal, Ruby," Yang said, playfully flicking her finger at Ruby's forehead.

Ed looked down at the red-haired girl in the center of the arena. If it were a month ago, he would have never guess that she was capable of such a thing, and judging from the lack of sweat or any signs of exertion, he would have had even more reason to assume that Yang and Ruby were lying to him. But after watching Pyrrha fight several times in the ring, and even fighting against her a few times, he didn't doubt that she had handled the four on one fight with relative ease, depending on what team she was against.

"Who was she fighting?" He asked, not bothering to keep the surprise out of his voice.

"CRDL," Yang answered, pointing her thumb at the team that had just sat down at the other end of the room, nursing various points of their bodies.

Ed nodded. It made sense that Pyrrha could beat them so easily. While the group was made up of quite formidable fighters, they were horrible when fighting as a group. Perhaps Professor Goodwitch had set up the match in order to emphasize that weakness. He had noticed that it was a tactic that she seemed to enjoy, and was pleasantly surprised that whenever he was called up to fight, he would learn something new about his own fighting. He wasn't used to fighting in such a controlled and danger-free environment and he wasn't used to watching other people fight either, but he quite enjoyed it. It was a strange experience to be a spectator of a fight and not a participant, but he could see that watching a fight could be as much of a learning experience as actually being the one to fight.

When he let his eyes wander away from team CRDL and back to the arena, he was surprised to see that he didn't recognize the student that was currently standing in the ring with Pyrrha. While he couldn't say that he had memorized the names of all the students in his year, he at least vaguely remembered their faces.

"That's Mercury." He had to hold back from instinctively punching Envy's in his sociopathic serial killer face as he heard his voice come from behind him. "He's a transfer student, kind of like us."

"Oh yeah, I forgot to mention," Yang said, before he could get a word in. "We went to your room this morning and we met Envy. I'd say we're pretty good pals now." She reached up to lightly punch Envy on the shoulder and he grinned in return, though he did retreat from the punch with an overexaggerated expression of pain.

"Really," Ed said, still giving Envy a deadpan stare. "You're making friends now?"

"Yeah I am. Even made some friends that weren't already yours." As he said this, he made sweeping gesture with his arm as if to display the two people in the seats to the right of him. The two girls gave him a short wave and a smile.

"Hello, my name is Cinder Fall," the dark-haired girl said, extending her hand out for him to take.

"Edward Elric." He took her hand and shook it.

"As I understand it, you and Envy are something like transfer students, are you not?" she asked, giving a sweet smile. "We're transfer students from Haven, and Envy was generous enough to introduce us to new friends, and apparently he is still continuing to do so." She turned her smile to Envy and he bowed theatrically, though he remained seated.

"Nice to meet you," he said, letting go of her hand.

"I'm Emerald Sustrai." The green-haired girl sitting beside Cinder gave him a wave, as she would have had to stretch to offer a handshake from three seats away. "The guy down there is Mercury. He's our teammate, but nobody will blame you if you want to ignore him."

Ed gave a short laugh and waved back. "Nice to meet you, Emerald."

She gave him a nod in reply and she opened her mouth to talk again, but Glynda's voice interrupted her.

"If neither fighter has any issues, you may begin."

Emerald gave Ed a short shrug and turned her attention to the stage below. Following her lead, he turned to see that Mercury was running towards Pyrrha, unarmed. Or rather, he probably had a hidden weapon or one that was small enough to be unnoticeable from this far away.

He watched as Mercury dove into a kick only to have it blocked and have his legs sweeped out from underneath him. It wasn't an uncommon pattern to see when it came to any of Pyrrha's fights, but the way that Mercury kicked up almost instantly while flaring his legs out to prevent any counter attack was something that most of the other students wouldn't have done so quickly.

Without giving him much time to compose himself, though to be honest Mercury didn't seem all too shaken by the turn of events anyways, Pyrrha rushed forward and initiated her own attack, launching a flurry of blows. While he didn't recognize the fighting style, he was impressed by the fluid motions that Mercury made as he blocked the sword strikes with his legs. So he had some sort of armor on his legs, or else he would have taken at least some damage in his Aura, unless he had some sort of invincible body.

That theory was immediately disproven when Pyrrha thrust her shield into Mercury's abdomen, launching him backwards and causing his Aura to dip slightly.

"Hey, Mercury's pretty good," he heard Ruby say from beside him.

"Please don't let him hear you say that," Emerald said, giving a short laugh. "If his head gets any bigger we won't be able to fit it through any doors."

Ignoring the banter behind him, Ed looked on to see Mercury pressing the attack, pulling of a series of complicated flips and kicks that not only impressed him but also confused him to some degree, despite having been witness a wide range of inhuman fighting styles. Unfortunately for Mercury, Pyrrha seemed to have enough understanding of the fighting style to block the incoming blows and was even able to throw her weapon up into the air as Mercury's foot soared towards the side of her head. Fortunately for her, she was able to block the blow with her arms and fortunately for Mercury, her arms didn't have any sort of protection that could completely guard the damage. Her Aura dropped slightly as a result.

Unfortunately for Mercury, this little exchange meant that he probably had no chance of winning.

Even though Ed didn't use any weapons of his own, preferring to use Dust or improvised weapons instead, the fact that he had an automail leg meant that as soon as Pyrrha had used her Semblance against him, it was impossible for him to be ignorant of it.

The exchange after the fight had been an awkward one. Though she had approached him in order to keep her secret safe, he had approached her to keep his secret safe as well. Neither of them had know that either of them was keeping a secret in the first place, so it led to a whole chain of misunderstandings. Eventually, Pyrrha had explained that for now, she was keeping her Semblance hidden from everybody, except for Ruby and Weiss who had found out by accident. She promised to tell everybody about her Semblance once missions started, but she preferred to keep it unknown for as long as possible. In return, Ed had asked Pyrrha not to mention his automail leg. At first, she was convinced that he was only keeping his "leg armor" as a secret weapon but after he explained how his leg was prosthetic, she had paled and profusely apologized. He had accepted the apology, of course, but asked for her to keep it a secret and for her to not use her Semblance on his leg from then on.

Pyrrha's use of her Semblance was very subtle and almost unnoticeable, but that was only when it was applied to weapons. Even in Yang's case, where her weapon was attached to her arm, she probably didn't notice the slight movements in her arm and attributed Pyrrha's unnatural dodges to her skill. In Ed's case it was different. It was very obvious and very unnerving when someone else was controlling your limbs for you.

And thus, with nothing to use her Semblance on, the playing field was a bit more level whenever he fought Pyrrha, due to the convenient handicap that her promise had given him. Unfortunately for Mercury, there was no such handicap in place and though he was able to hurt her in exchange, the fact that she had now magnetized his boots gave Pyrrha a huge advantage.

And so he sighed, pre-emptively marking the match as a win for Pyrrha. True, he was surprised when Mercury had managed to penetrate Pyrrha's guard and kick her sword out of her hand, a feat that only a handful of people in the class had managed, but he knew that when the second kick flew out to attack her, it just wouldn't hit.

And true to his prediction, Mercury's leg flew past Pyrrha's face barely missing. He watched as Mercury paused for a moment, no doubt confused at what had just happened, but was surprised when Mercury chose to look up at his direction instead of focusing his attention back to the fight. Even from the far distance that separated the fighters from the spectators, he could tell that Mercury wasn't looking at him. In fact, he wasn't sure if he was looking at anything at all. It was quite possible that he was just dazed from the fight so far.

But then he saw Mercury's mouth frown slightly and his head hung slightly in what could have been a nod or a sigh.

And then he swerved around to catch Pyrrha's sword on his foot with a smirk on his face. Bringing his foot down, he forced Pyrrha's sword and hand to the ground along with it. Putting his full weight onto the sword, he lifted his other leg to send a kick toward Pyrrha's once again. Faced with the decision of giving up her weapon or taking an attack to the face, Pyrrha made the obvious decision and lifted her shield to block the attack, using the momentum to help her jump backwards, and leaving her sword under Mercury's foot.

Not a moment later, Mercury seemed to stumble as the sword beneath him began to unfold into the shape of a spear. The mechanisms struggled to unlock under his weight, but as he awkwardly stepped off, the snap of the transformation bounced it against the floor and up into the air, perfectly landing in Pyrrha's outstretched hand.

"Woah…" Yang's voice was filled with awe as she muttered under her breath. "I thought she was a goner. How'd she set that up so quickly?"

She didn't seem to actually expect an answer from anyone, so Ed let the question be. While it had seemed like Pyrrha had activated her weapon's mecha-shifting as soon as Mercury had touched it with his foot, angling it and timing it perfectly so it would throw him off balance and return to her predicted landing spot, the truth was impressive in a different way. Pyrrha could control her weapon perfectly without touching it, but she was no omniscient prophet of war. Even so, Ed felt that the need to honour his promise was much greater than his desire to correct an intentional misunderstanding.

A loud echoed through the stadium as Pyrrha thrust her spear forward, using Milo's firing mechanisms to give it some extra momentum. Still put off balance by her previous stunt, Mercury took the brunt of the attack to his chest. Though his Aura prevented his impalement, he was still sent back flying.

He landed flat on his back and he could hear the soft groans of some of his classmates as they felt the secondhand pain. He also heard a somewhat violent cough coming from behind him.

Mercury lay there for a few seconds, but the subtle sound of Pyrrha transforming Milo into its rifle form, caused him to lift his head and look up. As Pyrrha aimed Milo, Mercury kicked off the floor to balance himself on his hands, and then proceeded to push off his hands to land in a ready position.

Except there was no floor beneath his feet. Pyrrha's last blow had sent him much farther than he might have expected and he had flipped backwards to gain some distance, not realizing that he was backflipping off the stage.

He winced as he heard a hard thumping sound come from below arena, and again he heard a few groans of sympathy coming from his classmates. He heard a noise from behind him, though this time he could easily hear Emerald's hysterical laughter as she struggled to hide it with her obviously fake coughing.

"The winner is Pyrrha Nikos," Professor Goodwitch's voice rung out through the entire room as she walked out onto the stage. Walking over to Pyrrha, she said something to her that wasn't amplified by her microphone, and turned back to the rest of the class as Pyrrha jogged to the edge of the stage.

"I hope you were paying attention class. Could anyone point out anything that Ms. Nikos did especially well in this fight?" Professor Goodwitch said as Pyrrha reached a hand over the edge of the stage. After each fight, Professor Goodwitch would inform each fighter of a fatal flaw in their fight that had either cost them the fight, or had the potential to cost them the fight. In the more uncommon scenarios where the fighter had not made a meaningful or obvious mistake, advice was taken from the fight and given to the spectators instead. As this was the case for most of Pyrrha's fights, a few hands were raised, already ready for the question. "Ms. Goldenrod," Professor Goodwitch called out.

"Nikos used her foresight to throw her opponent off balance with the transformation of her weapon, even when she could not interact with it." The voice came from across the room as Weiss lowered her arm, muttering about how she had been the first to raise her hand.

Professor Goodwitch gave a short nod. "While Ms. Nikos had the ability to use her shield as a projectile, this option may have left her defenseless if she had missed. Though she had multiple options to choose from, she simply chose the best available one to her."

From the edge of his vision, he saw that Pyrrha had managed to grab Mercury's hand and lift him back onto the stage.

"Mr. Black." Professor Goodwitch spoke again, returning to her more familiar style of lecture. "While your display was truly impressive, the one mistake that cost you the bout was your awareness of the battlefield. However, despite taking a strong attack, your Aura was still relatively high and had you not fallen off of the stage, perhaps you could have given Ms. Nikos her first loss."

Mercury smiled and Ed could see his lips moving, but couldn't hear the words from that far away. From the way that Professor Goodwitch gave him a short nod, he could guess that Mercury had thanked her, or something similar.

"And that is the final fight for today. Remember that the dance is this weekend, but ensure that you do not slack off in your training. Your first official missions as Hunters-in-training will take place on the Monday after, and I expect you all to represent your respective schools with pride."

Pyrrha and Mercury waited outside of the arena in order to avoid the small wave of students who were either hurrying to get to their next classes or just eager to take a break. The other members of their respective teams had avoided the crowd in the opposite manner and stayed behind until they weren't in any danger of being squished or dragged along. When they finally did reunited with the two fighters, Ruby immediately ran up to both of them, bouncing on her toes.

"You guys were so cool! It was such a close fight!" she exclaimed, waving her arms to try and emphasize the excitement that she felt.

"You got that right," Yang said, cutting into the 'conversation' before Ruby got too excited. "You might even beat my record of how close I got to beating Pyrrha."

Mercury shrugged nonchalantly. "Personally, I don't know if I had a chance. Maybe I was lucky to have fallen out of the ring. I might have lost in an even more embarrassing way if I kept on fighting."

"If I may," Pyrrha said, giving Mercury a polite smile. "I don't think you should doubt yourself so much. There were many times during that fight where you had the upper hand. I'm not confident in saying that I would have won if our fight had continued."

"Nah, I know when I'm outclassed," he said giving a small laugh. Then he suddenly froze and put his hand under his chin, giving an impression that he was thinking hard about something. "Say, you're obviously a really good fighter, but how good are you at teaching?"

"She's a great teacher!" Jaune piped up. "I've gotten miles better ever since she started to teach me how to be a better fighter."

"Hmm," Mercury mused, repeating the thinking gesture again.

"If I'm to be honest, I don't think I should teach you any of my skills. I can only teach Jaune because our fighting styles are similar, and quite frankly you're style is incredibly developed. I don't think I have the power to help you get even better than you already are," Pyrrha suggested, before giving him a grin. "And to be honest, I don't enjoy the idea of giving a rival an advantage over me." She offered her hand to him as she said this.

"Oh, no. I wasn't talking about teaching me actually," he said, with a look of mild surprise on his face. It looked somewhat plastic, but from what Ed could tell, that was just how Mercury's expressions always were. "I was talking about this one," he said, reaching out for his teammate and pulling Emerald closer by the waist. She promptly pushed the hand away and punched him in the chest. From the genuine look of pain on Mercury's face, Ed guessed she actually had hit him.

Pyrrha tilted her head in confusion. "Emerald? I'm sorry, but I don't know your fighting style. What could I teach you that would be useful?"

Mercury smiled and placed his hands onto Emerald's shoulders. "Well, our little Emerald over here." He jumped away as Emerald swatted at him. "Fights like she flirts. She likes to lie, or rather, she likes to deceive people."

"Ugh," she said, throwing her hands up and walking away. "I swear, every day I want to kill you so much more."

"See? All lies. She totally wants me."

"I'm sorry, I don't understand what you mean," Pyrrha said a bit weakly.

"Yes Mercury, I agree with our friend here. I don't understand what part of Emerald could be considered to be deceitful. She is a good person and I will not have you influencing our dear friends to think otherwise." Cinder interrupted with a sharp edge of anger in her voice.

"I- I was just getting to that," Mercury said, a bit too quickly and with a short stutter. He coughed into his fist. "As I was saying, Emerald's weapons have a really complex mechanism that needs very precise finger movements. I was thinking you should teach her your sleight of hand techniques so she can practice."

"Sleight of hand?" Pyrrha asked, obviously confused.

"Yeah," Mercury said, giving her a wide but typically plastic smile. "That trick you pulled with your weapon. I had made sure that you didn't tamper with it when I was kicking it away, but you managed to press a button or something so quickly that I couldn't even notice. Really impressive."

Pyrrha opened her mouth to say something, but Mercury leaned in sideways with a hand hiding his mouth.

"If I'm going to be honest, I think I'm the best fighter in the first year of Haven, but everybody there loves to pull dirty tricks," he said in a loud whisper, as if he were trying to keep a secret but not understanding the concept of volume. He pulled back, but stretched out his hand towards her. "In a way, it's refreshing to lose to someone purely because I'm outclassed, and not because of some sort of gimmicks. I know I was a bit pessimistic before, but I hope you didn't take that seriously. I look forward to fighting you again, rival."

Out of the corner of his eye, Ed saw Ruby and Weiss wincing a bit. Pyrrha herself looked stricken with guilt, though she hid it well with a half-formed smile as she took Mercury's hand. He shook it enthusiastically, but her arm had a limp quality to it. He let go, apparently not noticing Pyrrha's dampened spirits.

"So about those lessons for Emerald," Mercury started, causing Pyrrha's shoulders to droop even further.

"Hey, if I could just interrupt for a second, here," Ed said without thinking, pushing himself between Mercury and Pyrrha.

He expected that someone to speak up or rather, he hoped that someone would say something in response to his because he hadn't thought of any reason he could give for his interruption.

Everybody stared at him for a few seconds, before Mercury spoke up.

"Who's this shortie?" He asked, turning to his teammates with a genuine look of confusion.

Before he was even aware of it, his dormant instincts activated and his fist flew towards Mercury's face. Mercury dodged the punch, ducking under it with a casual air.

"Oh, that's just Ed." Envy spoke up, drawing Mercury's attention.

"Hmm…" Mercury mused, scanning him lazily. "Thought he'd be taller to be honest."

Another fist flew and was dodged just as easily as the first.

"Umm… you shouldn't-"

"Yeah I know, right?" Envy said happily, cutting off Pyrrha's interjection. "Everybody back home used to call him pipsqueak. He used to be a lot shorter, too."

"RRAGH!" Ed screamed as he flew towards Envy, feet first. "Who are you calling so miniscule that you'd need a microscope to look at?!"

Envy gave a small giggle as he dodged away from the kick. "Oh, that actually reminds me!" He gave a look mock realization even as he dodged the second incoming kick. "Congratulations on finally breaking the five foot height barrier!"

Ed barely registered the fact that he was clapping his hands together, but when he realized that his enraged mind was urging him to beat the homunculus down to the ground, he didn't bother to resist it.

In a flash of blue light and a small cloud of smoke, a pillar of earth grew from the ground to strike Envy's chin, but he backflipped away almost casually.

"You'll have to do better than that pipsqueak," he said, laughing as he ran through the halls.

"Whoareyoucallingsosmallthatyouwouldn'tevennoticeifyousteppedon?!" Ed cried out, his words quick and almost incoherent if it weren't for the fact that, other than the Haven team, everyone standing nearby was already used to listening to Dr. Oobleck's lectures. He chased Envy down the hallways, using his alchemy to try and crush and break Envy until his mouth stopped moving.

The remaining students, simply stared in the direction that they went. Hidden by the maze of pillars that Ed was creating in his mad murderous rage, it wasn't long before nobody could see them.

"Well," Yang said. They could all hear the loud thumping noises of destruction coming from around the school. "That was a thing."

* * *

"If I'm going to be honest, I was kind of annoyed when that Envy kid talked to us at first, but I'm so glad we decided to stick by them." Mercury said lying down on the ground, flipping through a comic book. "I was so afraid that attending classes would be boring, but if every day has as much slapstick comedy as today I think I'll enjoy it much more. Do you think that Edward kid will destroy half the school every time I call him short?"

Emerald rolled her eyes at the comment, but was rather curious about the answer to that question herself. As much as she hated to admit it, Mercury's sense of humor wasn't too far from her own.

"I'm surprised you're so interested in the kid, but I guess I can't blame you for having your own taste in men."

"Don't worry Emerald, I'll always have space for you in my heart."

"And it'll give me the utmost pleasure to tear that piece of your heart from out of your body. I'll leave it up to you to decide whether I meant that literally or not."

"If you wanted a piece of me, you could've just asked. Though I wholeheartedly recommend taking the whole package."

"Eww. Don't make me vomit."

"Don't worry, I'm not into that."

"Well… you…"

Emerald words slowed a bit as she struggled to find out why the conversation had seemed so strange. She and Mercury fought all the time, so there shouldn't be any reason for the insult trading to be awkward, but when she looked at Mercury's expression she could tell that even he felt that something was… off. Not too strange, but certainly something wasn't normal.

"Isn't this the part where you tell us to shut up?" Mercury offered, reminding Emerald of Cinder's presence in the room.

Cinder didn't speak. Her hands loosely held the black dress in her lap, but her fingers had stopped moving. Beside her on the bed was a small needle and a spool of string, discarded and untouched by her side. Her brow was furrowed with concentration and she gave no indication of having heard Mercury.

"Cinder?" Emerald asked, more cautiously than Mercury had.

Cinder looked up at the sound of her name with an expression of mild surprise, as if she had momentarily forgotten that she wasn't alone in the room. "What is it?"

"It's nothing," Emerald said. "But you seemed… out of it."

She didn't know if it was the right thing to say. Talking to Cinder was a balancing act that she was used to, and she knew that anything that she said that sounded vaguely like an order, or anything that suggested that she could understand how Cinder felt was often dangerous.

"I was just deep in thought," Cinder said absentmindedly.

Emerald looked to Mercury, but only found that he was staring back at her with the same confused expression.

"Mercury," Cinder said, causing his head to snap back to her. "Give me a full review of our day, starting from when Envy approached us during breakfast."

It took a small moment for Mercury to start speaking as he organized the thoughts in his head. "When Envy Jealous walked up to us, I tried to refuse his friendship, but you recognized the fact that he was willing to introduce us to the team that had beaten Roman Torchwick in that failed dust heist, as well as the renowned Pyrrha Nikos, so you interjected so we could get closer to them. After that, we mingled among them and went along with them to combat classes and sat with them. Near the end of the class, I initiated a spar with Pyrrha Nikos and learned that her Semblance is polarity. I intended to forfeit the fight after learning this, but you signalled for me to keep fighting. I'm assuming that was to keep up a good relationship between our teams. Nothing else in that class really stood out, but when we exited, I accidentally aggravated Edward Elric. This led to Edward Elric becoming infuriated with Envy Jealous who seemed to be intentionally taunting him, and Edward Elric chased him throughout the school, causing a large amount of property damage with his Semblance. Glynda Goodwitch heard the commotion and quickly subdued both Envy Jealous and Edward Elric. While we followed team RWBY and team JNPR to our next class, you excused-"

Cinder held up a hand and Mercury trailed off, letting his sentence die out.

"Were there any details that you excluded in your review?" she asked.

Mercury thought for a moment before giving a shrug. "Nothing important, really."

A few moments passed before Cinder spoke again. "Emerald. Did you notice any details that Mercury couldn't?"

Emerald shook her head almost immediately, despite being caught off guard.

"Interesting…" Cinder mused, but she said nothing else. It only took a few seconds for Emerald's curiosity to win out against her caution.

"Did you notice anything that we didn't?" she asked.

Cinder didn't move for a second, and Emerald was tempted to ask the question again just in case Cinder hadn't heard her. Ten seconds passed before Cinder pulled out a white glove from a pocket hidden on the inside of her uniform. Emerald flinched back in fear.

Cinder turned the glove over in her hands, and Emerald could see that the red design on the back was glowing with a soft pulsing light. She looked away. She couldn't help but feel a bit foolish, but it seemed like the symbol of the eye was staring directly at her.

"This child has been very excited for most of the day," Cinder said with the soft and inflective voice that made it seem like she was only talking to herself. "Ever since our new friend went on his little rampage. She has been eager to come out." Cinder casually slid the glove onto her hand. "Edward Elric." She toyed with the name as she turned her hand over to look at the pulsing eye.

Another pause in conversation.

"What is he?" Mercury asked the question that Emerald was thinking.

Cinder looked up, frowning slightly. "A mystery." So Cinder was clueless? Emerald didn't dare to ask and unfortunately, Mercury seemed to have the sense to hold back his tongue as well. "But for now, he will not be the type of mystery that we will try to solve. Stay on your guard, but do not take any actions. Assume that Edward Elric and Envy Jealous are dangerous. We will continue to try and befriend them. Do not do anything that could be considered to be suspicious."

Emerald nodded, but a question bubbled up from within. "When will we know what to do with them?"

Cinder took the glove off and gave a brief glance at it before stowing it away into her pocket.

"It may take several weeks, or even months before we hear back from my Queen. For now, we will proceed with our previous plans with no alterations or interruptions."

Emerald nodded.

* * *

 **So I tried to use some random RWBY name generator to create a temporary side character who would be the teacher's pet and answer Glynda's question, just so I didn't have to use Weiss. Some of the randomly generated names are absolutely hilarious.**

 **Basically, as far as I know, it takes random colour objects and makes names out of them. I just opened the page now and one of the names was Sugg from (Sugar). It's beautiful.**

 **Anyways, it was ultimately pointless because last names don't need to follow the colour rule. Silly me.**

* * *

 **I enjoyed writing this chapter's fight scene, mostly because there wasn't much fighting in my fight scene.**

* * *

 **Nothing else to report. At this point I'm just inflating the story's word count I guess. See ya'll next week hopefully.**


	14. Chapter 14

**I'm changing my update schedule to be once every two weeks MINIMUM. More info at the bottom of the chapter.**

* * *

 **I'm pretty sure at this point I could rename to fanfic to Envy's Adventures and noone would see anything wrong with it.**

* * *

 **Warning: This chapter was not edited or reread in the very least. This is a first draft. You have been warned.**

* * *

"Yang?"

Weiss's voice snapped Yang's attention onto her. She turned away from the door to look at her teammate.

"What's up?" she asked.

Weiss stared back at her for a moment, with a look that made it seem like she was trying to decide whether Yang was being sarcastic. It was a look that she was used to getting and she usually felt pretty proud whenever Weiss appreciated her jokes to give her the deadpan glare, but she couldn't help but feel that she hadn't done anything to deserve it this time.

"No seriously, I haven't even said anything yet. Why are you giving me that look?"

Weiss jerked her head at the door, keeping her arms akimbo. "You've been staring at that door for half a minute. Why don't you just knock?"

Yang shrugged. "I don't know. Just anxious, I guess?"

Weiss raised an eyebrow. "What's there to be anxious about?"

Yang shrugged again, knowing her worries were silly even before she said them out loud. "I mean, last time we knocked on this door, a Beowolf opened it. I'm just wondering if more crazy things will happen."

Weiss opened her mouth as if to say something, but took a moment to think before actually speaking. "I will admit, that was somewhat shocking, but there's no reason why you should be so paranoid. That was the only time that we've been greeted with such a… strange sight."

"Well, I wouldn't say it was the only time. Remember when he opened the door and his hands were on fire?" Yang argued.

"Hardly something that we should consider surprising," Weiss countered. "We know that Dust is a new concept to him and that he is experimenting with it almost constantly. Besides, that already happened once before with Nora and you didn't seem very surprised then."

"Nora's different. I wouldn't be surprised by anything she does."

"And you would be surprised by anything that Edward does?"

Yang raised an eyebrow at this. "He seems pretty normal."

Weiss gave Yang a genuinely confused look. "Other than Ruby, he's the youngest student in the school. He has that strange power." Weiss spoke in a low volume and looked around to make sure the halls were empty before she said this, but once she saw that they were alone she continued at her regular volume. "He tore a Grimm apart with his bare hands, and his best friend seems to pretend to be a Beowolf for fun."

"I guess you're technically right," Yang admitted. "But that's not really that big of a deal in my opinion. Sure he's young, but like you said, so is Ruby. I still don't know what the big deal about that weird power is. I can't tell why it's so different from a Semblance and I don't even think he's trying to hide it at this point. He uses it all the time in combat class. I tear apart Grimm with my hands all the time and I know you've seen that way too many times for it to be something new. I'll admit Envy's quirks are a bit weird though, but I thought we were talking about Edward and not his best friend."

Weiss raised a finger and seemed to be about to raise another argument as well, but Yang was quickly startled by the creak of the door behind her.

"First of all, that whole Beowolf thing was an accident," Envy said, peeking his head out of the crack of the door. "Second of all, I think our little Edward doesn't think of me as his best friend, no matter how much love I show him."

"Oh hey, Envy. Were we being too loud?" Yang gave an embarrassed smile and a wave. "Well, now that you're here could you call Ed for us?"

"Already on it," Envy replied. He pushed the door open a bit more to reveal that his hand was wrapped around the collar of Ed's uniform and the boy in question was sitting on the floor. "He's supposed to be helping you two out with something, right?"

It seemed odd that Ed was so calm even as Envy walked further out into the hall, dragging his body along with him. Ed seemed Yang knew that Ed could have a short temper at times, and she realized that Envy seemed to be an expert at pushing his buttons. In any case, while she hadn't ever seen whether Ed had a good opinion of being dragged along the floor, she knew for a fact that he hated to be called little, so it was quite strange to see that Ed wasn't currently lunging for Envy's throat.

"Yeah, Ms. G told us that he volunteered to help us decorate the grand hall for the dance," she said, still trying to figure out why Ed was so quiet about his abuse. A quick look at his face showed a sunken expression, chattering teeth, and wide eyes.

Envy nodded. "I know. He hasn't shut up about it ever since he was let out of the dungeon."

"Dungeon?" Weiss interrupted. Yang noticed that Ed was mumbling under his breath. She could make out a few words but mostly couldn't make any sense of what he was saying.

"Oh sorry, I meant detention. They sound pretty similar." Envy shrugged and Ed's body was lifted an inch to match the movements of Envy's shoulders. "Anyways, as you can see here, he's been talking in his sleep and doesn't seem to show any signs of stopping."

Yang leaned in closer to hear Ed mumbling, "Alchemy is not a toy. I will respect Beacon and its property. I will show restraint. Alchemy is not a toy…"

"You think he'll be able to help us if he's all zoned out like this? It might be better if he gets some more rest." Yang suggested, standing back up.

Envy shook his head. "He'll appreciate this when he wakes up, trust me. I don't think he'd appreciate it if we made him disobey Glynda's orders."

Yang thought for a moment that Ed's mumbling suddenly grew more high-pitched and faster. She swore to herself that she would never cause trouble in front of Professor Goodwitch.

"I kind of feel sorry for you guys for having to rely on such an unreliable midget, so how about I help out until Edward gets his wits back?" Envy said, giving a casual grin.

"That would be very much appreciated Envy, thank you for offering," Weiss replied. "But we should get going soon. While we are slightly ahead of schedule, I wanted to make sure that we had some extra time to do a double check."

"Alright, sounds good! Let's go!"

After grabbing Envy's shoulders and redirecting him to the correct decision, Yang was content to let him talk with Weiss. She wasn't all too interested in how Goodwitch had managed to capture Ed and lecture him for the reckless use of his powers. She hoped that Envy was just a well-practiced storyteller and that his claims of how the Professor had kept him locked up for hours and used torture devices were just an exaggeration to make the story interesting. In either case, Ed's near catatonic state didn't help to convince her otherwise.

But brushing the issue of child abuse away, she idly wondered about why Ed's powers were so special that she and the entirety of RWBY and JNPR would be forced to keep it a secret. It was easy to admit that his powers were pretty impressive, but impressive seemed to be a consistent theme when it came to Huntsmen and Huntresses anyways. She would have continued to think more on the subject, but an irritating scraping noise prevented her from concentrating any harder.

"What's that sound?" Yang asked once she heard a break in Envy and Weiss's conversation.

Still walking, Envy turned around to give Yang a puzzled look, but almost immediately his face brightened up and he raised his arm, swinging Ed's body off of the floor and onto his shoulder. The sound stopped, but Ed's eyes shot open.

"Arghh!" he shouted, flailing around on Envy's shoulder. They both fell to the floor in a tangle of limbs.

"Good morning, sunshine!" Yang waved cheerily as Ed's eyes scanned his surroundings frantically. He seemed to calm down once he saw her and Weiss's familiar faces.

"Umm, good morning?" he said uncertainly. He looked around again, but this time he was more calm about it. "Where am I?"

"We dragged you out of your room so you could help us out with the dance." Yang pointed down. "Though technically, he was the only one who actually dragged you up until this point."

Ed gave her a confused look and followed the direction that her finger pointed.

"Hey," Envy groaned.

"Arghh!" Ed shouted again, jumping off of Envy's body immediately.

* * *

"Alright, you kids have fun with your decorating and stuff," Envy said, stopping and waving to them as they opened the doors to the hall.

"Not gonna help us out?" Yang asked.

"I did say that I'd only help out until Edward woke up, right? While I would be happy to help you two out, I also don't want to do anything that would reduce Edward's workload." He flashed a grin at them. "Gotta keep him busy or else his temper flares. We wouldn't want a repeat of what happened yesterday."

Edward mumbled something under his breath, but simply walked through the door.

"He loves me."

Yang and Weiss exchanged a look that clearly displayed how much confidence they had in his claim.

"Well anyways, I'll be off."

"You sure you don't want to stick around? You don't exactly have to help out if you don't want and you'd have a good excuse for not going to your classes." Yang gave him a cheeky grin as she said this, ignoring Weiss's glare.

"Class?" Envy asked, finding himself in genuine confusion before quickly understanding what Yang meant. "Oh, you think I'm a student."

"You're not a student?" Yang and Weiss both spoke up simultaneously. They seemed to be surprised, but Envy entertained the possibility that they were more surprised by their impromptu harmony rather than the fact that he wasn't a student at their school.

"I'm still deciding on it. I don't really have a reason to be here, I'm just tagging along with Edward," he said, waving his hand flippantly as if shooing the thought away. "Well anyways, I'll be out of your hair for now. See you at the dance."

He walked away before they could ask any more questions. He barely registered the fading goodbyes as he turned the corner, too deep into his own thoughts to hear them properly.

The school dance, huh? He had never been to a school dance before, and the thought of it amused him. Social gatherings and events weren't an unfamiliar concept to him, and even though he despised ballroom dances, he was interested to see how it would look like when a large mass of schoolchildren pretended to be adults. It made him want to go and look, just to see the awkward idiocy and drama unfold.

But he wouldn't go. The school dance was something that everybody went to, whether they be a student or staff, and it would be strange for anyone to not go. That was what would make the school so vulnerable at that time. While he didn't exactly have any plans to advance, he knew that some people did.

He walked casually out of the front gates of the school and walked to the Bullhead terminal. He gave a polite nod to the person manning the register, and she gave him a return ticket, gave him a brief warning about when the last Bullhead would leave from the Valean terminal, and wished him a happy trip. He smiled and wished her a nice day.

Once he landed in the city below, he walked around for around half an hour before he took a shortcut through a narrow alleyway between two small stores that were both advertising how they had the best meals in Vale, though they did seem to serve a different type of cuisine. A old man with a bored face walked out of the other side of the alleyway.

The man walked around town, for a few more minutes before turning into a small park, settling onto a bench that stood a few feet away from the path.

He pulled out a small black scroll and opened it up. On the display, he saw a single button and pressed it three times, waited for two seconds and pressed it twice. He watched the screen until a few numbers popped up onto the screen. He then got up and walked away. If someone had followed him, they would have lost him as soon as he walked into small secluded side street.

The young woman walked towards the docks. Her high heels made a sharp clacking sound every time she took a step. Once she reached the familiar sight of the rows of storage buildings, she started to count down from twenty. Once she reached zero, she turned to the left and raised her hand to knock on the wall of the building, but she stopped herself when she saw that the door was already open.

Roman flinched a bit when he saw her, but she could tell that he was trying to keep his reaction subdued.

"Oh hey, Cinder. Wasn't expecting you here. How's the weather?" Roman asked. He took a cigar out of his pocket and rummaged around for his lighter.

"And pray tell, who exactly were you expecting at this unusual hour?" she asked, ignoring his own question entirely. Even though Roman's eyes were locked onto his own pockets as he rifled through them, searching for his lighter, she could tell that his eyes widened slightly.

"Just a business associate I've been expecting." His eyes still darted around his own body, purposefully avoiding her gaze.

"A business associate? And here I was, under the impression that you were too busy working for me to be making any friends." Her eyes narrowed and his widened even further.

"Why, you would be half-right in thinking that," he said, looking up at her and flashing a confident and casual smile. If she hadn't been so adept in lying, she would have assumed his wide-eyed expression from earlier was a trick of her own imagination. "I'm just outsourcing some of my work onto people who I know I can trust."

She let her eyes soften and started to walk towards him. "Why of course, Roman. You should always be able to rely on your good friends. Trust is such an important part of every business relationship." She slowly pressed a palm onto his chest. "So tell me my dear Roman. I hate to ask this of you, but what should I do when I learn that a dear business partner of mine has done something not so trustworthy?"

Roman froze on the spot. His hand twitched slightly on his cane, but she simply pressed harder onto his chest, stopping him before he even tried.

She sighed. "It's a shame really, I had such high hopes for you. What a terrible day it's been. I knew I shouldn't have come out when the weather was so boogalicious."

A few seconds of silence passed before Cinder stepped back. She took her hand off of Roman's chest and instead opted to clutch at her own stomach as she doubled over in laughter. Roman remained frozen, but now his teeth were grinding together and a vein was clearly visible on his forehead. She laughed even harder at that and fell over as her legs gave away from underneath her, and proceeded to roll around with laughter.

Suddenly, she felt herself stop laughing, not because she had suddenly regained her wits, but because her head had been blown off. She knew that her body had flopped to the ground limply, though she couldn't feel it due to the lack of a connected brain. In a sickening but familiar motion, she felt the flesh, muscles, nerves and bones from her neck grow into the shape of a head. Envy didn't bother to reform Cinder's head and instead regenerated his own head on top of her body.

"Sorry, Roman," he said with mock sincerity, pushing his body up to a kneeling position. He clasped his hands together and bowed. "I just didn't know any other way to integrate that ridiculous codeword into our conversation organically."

He heard the explosion and then he heard nothing. He internally chuckled as he didn't have the ability to chuckle outwardly. When he reformed enough of his head to actually hear again, Roman was shouting at him.

"And if you ever fucking decide to pull a stunt like that again, I'll kill…"

Envy's eyes reformed and he doubled over in laughter again, revelling in Roman's frustrated expression.

"I swear kid, I'll put you in a vat of concrete and I'll dump you into the middle of the ocean."

Envy wiped a tear from his eye. "As much as I'd like to see you try," he said, pausing to giggle. "I'd like to ask you not to do that. I don't have anybody to bail me out in this place, so it would take at least eight years to claw my way out."

Roman grumbled and reached into his jacket to pull out a lighter. Quickly lighting his cigar, he stowed it back into his pocket. "God, it's like working with two of you all of a sudden. I should've known it was just the kid when you didn't step in to save me."

Envy was suddenly aware of the hand that rested on his shoulder. He turned around to see that Neo Politan was behind him, one hand on her stomach and one hand on his shoulder for support as she doubled over, making all the motions of laughing without the actual sound.

"Pranks aside, there was a reason why I came to find you," Envy started, not cowed by Roman's visible fury. Or rather, he hadn't been cowed by Roman's previous fury that seemed to dissipate into resignation as soon as Neo appeared. Maybe this was a normal occurrence for him. He wondered if he and Neo could start some sort of competition.

"Oh, and what reason would that be?" Roman asked.

Envy idly noted that Neo had took her hand off of his shoulder and had disappeared from sight once again. "Did you know that Cinder is in Beacon right now?"

Roman shrugged. "I guessed that she'd be heading there soon, but she never explicitly told me anything. I just knew that she'd be 'transferring' over soon and figured that since she's here in Vale already…" He trailed off, tapping a bit of ash onto a floating ashtray… No, Neo was standing beside him, holding an ashtray to his mouth with one hand. "Well, it's not hard to assume from there."

Envy nodded. "Well, there's a school dance going on tonight."

"You thinking of asking her to dance?" Roman asked, a hint of a smile creeping into his voice. "Trust me, kid. You do not want to go there."

Envy shook his head. "You think a woman like her will want to go to a dance for children? No, I expect that she'll be eager to explore the other possibilities that the dance provides. I was hoping to catch her and potentially join her on her little escapades." When Roman didn't bother to interject, he continued. "She wants something at Beacon, and there's no way that she won't do something when security is so low."

Roman nodded. "Maybe you're right, kid. And maybe I know a few things that could help you in your quest to woo your lady, but that's the thing. I may know something that can help you, but I don't know anything about this that could help me."

"It would give you information."

"It would give me information that I either already know or don't care about."

"I was under the impression that she doesn't tell you much."

Roman eye twitched slightly. "And you would be right to think so, kid, but that's the thing about being smart. You can figure things out even if nobody tells you."

"Well, if you find someone who's smart, let me know. I'd like to ask him for some help."

Roman glared at him. "Kid, what's the real reason you're doing this? There's no way you're after something so petty."

Envy bowed. "You know me too well."

Roman shook his head. "I just know people too well. I especially know that you," he said, pointing a finger directly at him, "don't care about what other people normally do. So what's your endgame."

Envy smiled or rather, his smile had never left his face since he had reformed it after Roman's attack. He just remained as he was. "I think I've already told you. I want you to win, Roman."

"And how do you think your little stunt will change anything?" he asked, seemingly unimpressed.

Envy cocked his head. "Do you really think that you'll survive this whole mess if things stay the same? Do you really think that Cinder will keep you alive after you outlive your usefulness? Probably not," he said, answering his own question. He held up his fist out in front of him.

"So you have two options, my friend. One." He raised his index finger. "You can become even more useful than you already are. You have to make it so that she doesn't want to kill you. Two." He raised his middle finger to join the index finger. "You make her desperate. Someone throws a wrench in her plans. She might be able to handle any complications without your help, but will she be willing to take that risk?"

Roman took the cigar out of his mouth and tapped it. This time the ash fell to the floor. "And I suppose you're that wrench." He sighed.

Envy simply shrugged.

Roman sighed for a second time. "Neo put the sword away, you're only going to make a mess."

Envy's smile grew wider.

* * *

Seven minutes. She'd had smaller time constraints. This would not be a problem.

She peered around the corner of the wall. Judging from the presence of a lone soldier at the doors, she thought that seven minutes was almost too generous.

Cinder dashed to the next piece of cover. The soldier barely even noticed. He walked up slowly to investigate the noise, but she was already gone and she had crept up behind him. It only took a single solid strike to the neck to knock him out.

She entered the room, walking with a casual air that would help to lull the soldiers inside to a false sense of security. They noticed her and she continued to walk towards them. One of them pulled out his gun, reminding her of the trigger-happy nature of those who had never been in a real fight. She easily immobilized him and with the aid of his own gun, she killed another soldier who had been foolish enough to charge at her. No, these men had Aura, no matter how incompetent they seemed. It would take a much stronger weapon to kill them outright.

She needed to be quicker. She used her Semblance, spinning around to create sword of black glass in her hands. She held them with the familiarity of an old friend. She swung, slicing through the Auras of the two soldiers who rushed her. One of them was tougher, but she still managed to knock him out. It took six seconds.

She walked to the elevator and she called it down. She checked her watch. Six minutes and thirty seconds left. She walked into the elevator once the doors opened. She barely registered the two men who were already inside. It was only after she had walked in and pressed the button for the top floor when she raised her swords, knocking them out instantly.

Fifteen seconds passed and she arrived at the top floor. A soldier was waiting outside as the elevator doors opened. Unexpected, but unexpected was something that she had gotten accustomed to. She quickly combined her two swords to form a bow and materialized an arrow in her free hand. She pulled back and let loose. The soldier barely made a sound before the arrow went straight through his chest and he was knocked over by the force of it. His body fell to the ground, slumping against the main computer terminal.

Cinder stiffened at the sight, but relaxed once she realized that the kill had been clean. There was no blood splatter and as long as she stepped around the corpse carefully, none of it would get onto her clothing. Still, it was odd for a soldier to not have his Aura unlocked. Perhaps Ironwood was becoming more desperate. It was a good sign.

She maneuvered around the body to sit at the computer terminal. She took a moment to check whether there was any blood on the chair or on the computers themselves. She then took a second to see whether there was any blood on the floor. She frowned when she saw that the soldier's blood had seeped underneath the edge of the desk and onto where she would be placing her feet if she sat down.

She stood instead, bending over to place a small scroll against the screen. She reached over to type something the codes necessary to launch the program on the scroll.

She felt the pulsing of the glove in her back pocket and she stood at full alert, but perhaps she wouldn't have been able to dodge the incoming attack unless she was already standing. She stared wide-eyed at the Grimm claw that was grasped around where her head had once been.

"What-" she said, unable to stop herself from speaking despite knowing her need for disguise. She quickly closed her mouth, but the damage was done.

"Not what, little Cinder. The more important question is 'who?'" Though his eyes were hidden by his helmet, his maniacal grin was more than enough to convey his insanity.

Cinder's eyes narrowed and she shot at him wordlessly, aiming to add a second arrow through his heart. He caught it out of the air in an almost casual manner, as if he was picking dandelion seeds from the sky.

"Who are you?" Cinder growled, not caring for her broken disguise anymore.

The soldier held up both of his hands. In a slow trickle of red lightning, the Grimm claw faded away and a human hand replaced it. The pulsing in her pocket was growing even stronger.

"A friend," he said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

Cinder frowned. "What do you want." She didn't phrase it like a question. She demanded that he answer.

"I'm just a friend. I simply wanted to introduce myself, make myself known, letting you know that I love what you're doing and I encourage you to continue. As long as it suits me, of course." His smile was unnaturally wide. He was obviously no regular human being. Maybe it was his semblance?

"And if I do something that you don't enjoy?" She asked the question this time, but she said it in a challenging way. She wanted him to feel threatened.

"Cinder, Cinder, Cinder," he said, reminding her that she was the one being threatened. He placed his hands onto the sides of his helmet. There was a flash of red lightning and when he took the helmet off of his head, her own face was staring back at her. "You'll know." She could feel the pulsing through her whole body now.

The computers behind her made a small sound and the monitors turned on to display a single chess piece on each monitor.

"And it looks like there's no more reason for you to stay here, Cinder," Cinder's clone said to her. "Best be on your way."

"Neither is there any reason for me to let you live," she growled. This time, when she shot her arrows, she used one that was laced with a high amount of Red Dust. She was no longer afraid of damaging the terminal that her clone was standing beside.

This time when her clone caught the arrow, it exploded right in front of her face. She couldn't help but wince when she saw that half of her own face was singed, but she filed it away in the back of her mind. She vowed to never become like that.

"Of all the ways there are to die, fire by far the worst," Cinder's clone mused as the red lightning coursed across her face once again. Cinder grew anxious as the bug Grimm struggled against its bindings. "But I guess, you couldn't know that."

Cinder's fully formed face glared back at her. "Don't you dare try that again. Got it?" A disturbingly wide smile spread across her face.

She didn't know if she could say anything in return, but she soon found that she didn't need to. The elevator door opened behind her clone and when she saw the doors open, she saw Ruby Rose inside.

The disturbingly wide smile didn't fall off her clone's face until she placed the helmet back onto her head and turned to Ruby Rose. There was a dull flash of red light.

"A civilian?!" She shouted, but it was in a man's voice. The soldier turned around and tackled Ruby Rose to the ground. "Stay back, kid! She's too dangerous. We need to get you out of here!"

Cinder didn't stay long enough to hear Ruby Rose's reply. She quickly grabbed her scroll from the main computer terminal and had fled through the stairs. Once she got to the bottom, she ran as fast as she could to the main Beacon hall, entering through the back door that had been propped open by a small stone. She quickly threw away her mask and burned the Dust-infused clothes off her body, leaving only the long dress that she had been wearing underneath.

She looked around the hall frantically. Though she hadn't seen any soldiers following behind her, she could faintly hear the sound of their hard boots stomping on stone.

She quickly located Mercury due to his height and unique hair colour and pushed herself through the crowd, ignoring the cries of protests as she broke the atmosphere between many of the dancing couples. She tapped Emerald on the shoulder.

"I need to borrow Mercury," she said, keeping her voice low.

"Cinder?" Emerald asked, confused. "Is anything wrong?"

Cinder shook her head. "It's just something I need Mercury's help with. Stay here, enjoy the party." She hoped she didn't sound as anxious as she felt.

Without waiting for a response, she reached over for Mercury's hand and dragged him away towards the front entrance of the hall. Both Emerald and Mercury had nervous looks, but Mercury led himself be dragged away without any word and Emerald stayed as she was.

She cared even less about the children on the dance floor and she pushed through them without care. It took her complete concentration to not run towards the front doors.

When she finally got outside, she had no reason to walk and she ran instead, dragging Mercury to the side of the building. It was a small and somewhat secluded area, but even though it wasn't completely private, it would have to do.

She grabbed Mercury by the collar and pulled her close to him as she backed up against the wall.

"Pretend like you're pushing me against the wall," she hissed as she reached for her back pocket.

Though he was obviously confused, Mercury obediently place his hands against the wall, directly over Cinder's shoulders. When she took the glove out from her pocket, he started to back away in fear, but she hissed and grabbed at his left wrist.

The symbol pulsed with a dull red glow that seemed to absorb light, encroaching its immediate surroundings in shadow. When Cinder pushed the glove onto Mercury's chest with both hands, he made an inarticulate choking sound and started to back away. Cinder barked some order that she didn't fully understand, but thankfully Mercury seemed to understand well enough and he stayed still.

She concentrated as she poured her Maiden's power and her aura into the symbol, hoping that it would be enough to appease the parasitic Grimm inside. She didn't know how long she was doing it for, but after what seemed like a short lifetime, the pulsing slowed and dimmed. She drew a few gasps of air to compensate for the long time that she hadn't been breathing, and she leaned against the wall, exhausted.

"Hey you two, have you seen-"

"Dude!" A sharp whispered voice interrupted the first. Cinder looked over Mercury's shoulder to see that a pair of soldiers were walking quickly away from them. Though they were quite far away, Cinder could see that the visible half of his face was completely red and he was frantically explaining something to the other soldier.

"Cinder?" Mercury asked. His voice was ragged, as if he had been running for the entire day. He had a light sheen of sweat and his face was a ghostly pale colour. "What was that?"

"It was a cover," she said, surprised but pleased to find that her voice was calm. "I had some urgent business to attend to, but I also had to ensure that I had an alibi."

"No I mean the thing with the Grimm. What exactly happened up in that tower?"

Cinder placed a finger on his lips. "Not now, Mercury. I'll explain later. For now, we should go back to the dance. Chances are that the other students noticed our hasty retreat and we should be at the center of Beacon's rumour mill."

Mercury gave her a complicated look, but nodded after a second of thought. He pushed off against the wall, allowing Cinder to leave the confines of his arms. She grabbed his hand and he looked down at it in surprise.

"It wouldn't do to disappoint the gossip-mongers of Beacon Academy. Perhaps we will be dating for a few weeks or so. Nothing will come of it and we will break our relationship off in amicable terms, but for now we created a cover and we will keep it."

Mercury nodded stiffly but let himself relax in her hands.

When they rounded the corner of the building, they both saw Yang standing at the entrance. Yang's eyes scanned over the two of them and she grinned. "Looks like you two have been having some fun." She grinned even wider and Cinder couldn't help but wince back at the wideness of the smile. No. It wasn't the same. Her smile was natural and kind. That thing's just smiled to bare its teeth.

"Did we miss anything?" Cinder asked, giving Yang a smile that she hoped didn't look too tired.

Yang shrugged. "Weiss and Blake kind of hooked up with these two transfer students, team JNPR did some crazy impromptu dance routine, oh!" Yang's face lit up. "And Jaune came in a dress!"

Cinder's mouth made an O of surprise and she held her free hand up to her mouth, giggling into it. "Oh my!"

"Takes some balls to come to such a big event in a dress," Mercury spoke up.

Yang grinned at this. "I'd say it takes even more balls to drag away and make out with the hottest girl in the school." She wiggled her eyebrows to emphasize the point. She held a fist up. "Congrats, by the way."

Mercury smirked and raised bumped her fist with his free hand.

"Is there anything else we missed?" Cinder asked politely. "I'm afraid we lost track of time out there."

"I'm sure you did," Yang said, giving her a wink. "Well, Envy ran into the hall a couple of minutes ago and literally dragged Ed onto the dance floor. I think he managed to find some booze because he's acting a lot giddier than he usually is. A lot giddier. I mean, if I'm right in thinking he's been drinking, he's probably been doing it the whole night, which explains why he was gone for so long. In any case, it's pretty funny since Ed is too terrified of Miss G to make a scene, so he's stuck dancing with him for the rest of the night."

"We were actually interrupted by some soldiers a few minutes ago," Mercury said, taking notice of what Cinder was trying to find out. "What was that all about?"

Yang shrugged. "I don't know. They started asking around to see if anyone had seen some suspicious person. They were pretty vague about it though, they didn't have a description. I'm starting to think that they saw drunk Envy wandering around the campus and got freaked out."

Cinder gave her a warm smile. "Thank you for updating us, Yang."

"Hey no problem," she replied. "Now why don't you two lovebirds go back inside. The night's young!"

"It's midnight," Mercury noted.

"Which means the night is young!" Yang raised both hands in the air. Mercury high-fived one of the hands immediately, but Cinder took a moment before giving a smile and softly slapping her hand.

* * *

 **I expected this chapter to be a lot shorter, even though it's not even that long in the first place. I also basically did the entire writing process in a span of two days and it might be anything between a bit of a mess and a huge unsalvageable mess.**

* * *

 **If you don't want to read my reasoning for the scheduling, basically when I say I'm releasing one chapter per two weeks minimum means that I'm going to be releasing one chapter every two weekends, but I'm also going to be releasing a chapter in one week intervals in the case that I write ahead of schedule.**

* * *

 **My reasoning for the scheduling change:**

 **If I were to outline my writing process, I'd say my writing process for a single chapter goes a bit like this:**

 **First, I make a super basic list of what I want to change by the end of the chapter. Sometimes the list is longer, but often times it will only have a single entry on it. For example, last week's to-do list was to make Cinder call for Salem's help for whatever reason.**

 **Second, I make a "first draft" of the first few pages. If I like it, that usually means that the flow has enough integrity to keep it going for another 5000 or so words so I'll keep on going. If I don't like it, I'll rewrite it and make the rest of the story from there. For example, this chapter was supposed to start with a war-documentary-like retelling of Ed's torture experiences in Glynda's detention. I didn't like it so I skipped it. It still happened in my mind, but I didn't write it down.**

 **The problem with this writing process is that sometimes, I can't seem to get the initial push to write the rest of the chapter. When I get going, I can comfortably write it in two days or so, but I need some time to actually catch an idea and incubate it before I can release onto paper. Sometimes this takes a day and I'll have the chapter done by Thursday (which was the case for Chapter Thirteen) or it'll take a week for me to get an idea. This week was an example of the latter, where I wasn't focusing on getting an idea until later into the week. I got my idea on Friday, but I got drunk off my ass as well, so I didn't start writing until late Saturday. This also means that my idea didn't have enough time to incubate either. I also considered the option of delaying the release, but I really didn't want to do that without announcing it.**

* * *

 **SHAMELESS PLUG ALERT:**

 **There's also the fact a majority of my writing brain power this week went to another story that I'm thinking of doing. It's an original and I plan to do a serial web series eventually once I get some more integrity in the story and do some actual world building so it doesn't completely fall apart once I get to the nitty gritty details. So if you're interested, keep a look out for in my future Author's Notes. I'm pretty sure I'm not allowed to advertise in the actual story, but I think putting it in my Author Profile would be fine.**

 **Bare bones on the story: Medieval, light-fantasy world. Magic is real, but most people think it's storybook stuff since nobody really knows magic in the current age. Orphan kid wants to learn magic. Wandering man comes along and the kid finds out he can do magic. Man teaches the kid magic properly so the kid doesn't kill himself.**


	15. Announcement

Hey people.

 **Unfortunately I'm axing this series.** I didn't want to just stop updating indefinitely so I'm just putting it out there that I will not be continuing this series ever. Big sorry to anyone who enjoyed it while it lasted, but I realized that I just didn't have it in me to give this story a proper finish and I didn't want to bother with a rushed finish. There was just so much stuff that went wrong in the writing process of the story and that pushed me down into the corner. I could've potentially rescued the story if I kept writing, but I didn't want to waste my time with around eight chapters of rescue writing. Trust me, it would have been horrid.

Ed was too weak of a character, Envy was too strong of a character and I should have brought another Homunculus into the story instead, I shouldn't have included team JNPR at all (I love them too much, but they really didn't belong in this story), team RWBY was somewhat unnecessary as well (though more relevant than JNPR), and while I had my endgame I had no way to get there without having to slosh through waist-deep mud.

 **If anyone is curious about what I had planned for the series:**

Basically, I had only planned for this story to be a pretty short one with only one plot arc. Of course, that's not how it turned out since I had way too much fun with Ed's exploration and discovery of the world, but originally, the main storyline was supposed to go something like this:

\- Ed comes into the world and joins forces with Ozpin.  
\- Ed discovers Dust, Aura, his Semblance, and his Semblance's weird interactions with magic and the Grimm (so I had to pull a Homunculus into the story)  
\- Ed is sent on the search for the Fall Maiden's powers  
\- Cinder meets Ed and finds out that the Grimm are somewhat attracted to his Alchemy  
\- Ed discovers Cinder's identity and Cinder tells Salem about the weirdness of Alchemy  
\- Stuff happens in between  
\- Magic turns out to be the power to manipulate dimensions. The Maiden powers work because they take energy from other universes (other Truths). The Grimm are the dead souls from other Truths.  
\- Salem has magic and is the original creator of the Grimm. She creates Grimm by using other Truths as fuel.  
\- Battle between Ed and Salem. Ed enters Salem's soul and takes the power somehow.  
\- Ding Dong, the witch is dead.  
\- He goes back and with the new power, he is able to sacrifice Truth and bring Alphonse back from the gate.  
\- Ending

I learned a lot from writing this series, and even if you're angry about me chopping this I hope you give my future projects a look.

Upcoming in my story list, I'm planning to write a time travel fic where the 22 year old Blake comes back to the past and things happen. Shamelessly stealing the idea off Remnant's Reclaimer. Kind of. Hopefully I'll jumpstart it by next week.

If anyone wants to adopt this story, go for it! I'll beta-read if you want :D


	16. REWRITE IS UP

**Hey hey people!**

 **Korzark here.**

 **Good news! I'm rewriting A New Set of Rules! The first chapter is up! Now I own literally 20% of all the RWBY x FMA fics on this site! My plan is coming into fruition!**

 **That being said, some of you will be disappointed in that "New World, New Rules" won't be a remastered version of ANSR and is a full rewrite with only the basic premise still intact. It's still a fic about Ed coming into the RWBY-verse to learn how to transmute his "Truth" so he can save Al. That's still a thing but that's pretty much the only thing that survived from ANSR. Also, the time-frame in which Ed arrives is a bit different.**

 **So what does this mean? It means that almost everything will change about this story when you compare it to ANSR.**

 **Have fun!**


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